question
stringlengths 38
136
| date
stringlengths 12
18
| text_answers
dict | id
stringlengths 11
20
| fact_context
stringlengths 185
5.91k
| context
stringclasses 830
values | none_context
stringclasses 1
value | neg_answers
listlengths 2
62
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Who was the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation in 03/06/1999?
|
March 06, 1999
|
{
"text": [
"Ian McNaught-Davis"
]
}
|
L2_Q661178_P488_7
|
Albert Eggler is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1968 to Jan, 1972.
Ian McNaught-Davis is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1995 to Jan, 2004.
Edouard Wyss-Dunant is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1964 to Jan, 1968.
Charles Egmond d’Arcis is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1932 to Jan, 1964.
Jean Juge is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1972 to Jan, 1976.
Pierre Bossus is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1976 to Jan, 1984.
Carlo Sganzini is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1984 to Jan, 1989.
Pietro Segantini is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1990 to Jan, 1995.
Frits Vrijlandt is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2020.
Alan Blackshaw is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2005.
Mike Mortimer is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2011.
|
International Climbing and Mountaineering FederationThe International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation, commonly known by its French name Union Internationale des Associations d'Alpinisme (UIAA, lit. "International Union of Alpine Clubs") was founded in August 1932 in Chamonix, France when 20 mountaineering associations met for an alpine congress. Count Charles Egmond d’Arcis, from Switzerland, was chosen as the first president and it was decided by the founding members that the UIAA would be an international federation which would be in charge of the "study and solution of all problems regarding mountaineering". The UIAA Safety Label was created in 1960 and was internationally approved in 1965 and currently (2015) has a global presence on five continents with 86 member associations in 62 countries representing over 3 million people.The UIAA is today the international governing body of climbing and mountaineering and represents climbers and mountaineers around the world on a wide range of issues related to mountain safety, sustainability and competition sport.The International Climbers’ Meet, the goal of these meets is to foster good will and cultural understanding through our shared passion of climbing by hosting a diverse group of climbing abilities from a multitude of countries.The UIAA Safety Commission develops and maintains safety standards for climbing equipment. These standards are implemented worldwide by the manufacturers who also participate in annual Safety Commission meetings. The Commission works with nearly 60 manufacturers worldwide and has 1,861 products certified.Dynamic Rope UIAA fall count ratingThe test to determine the fall count uses a 5.1m rope and drops a weight (80 kg single rope / 55 kg double rope) so that it falls 4.8m before experiencing a reaction force from the rope. This means that the weight is falling below the fixed end and there is minimal rope to stretch and absorb the force. The fall count rating is the number of times the rope can undergo this test before breaking. For the dynamic rope to be UIAA certified it requires a fall count rating of 5 or more.This number does not indicate that the rope needs to be discarded after this many falls while climbing, since a fall would usually not have the climber fall beyond the belayer and there is usually more rope to stretch and absorb the fall. There has been no recorded accidents of a UIAA certified dynamic rope breaking without there being damage from a sharp edge or chemical.Mountain Medicine DiplomaTogether with the International Society of Mountain Medicine (ISMM) and the International Commission for Alpine Rescue (ICAR), the UIAA Medical Commission has established and developed a joint Diploma in Mountain Medicine that establishes minimal requirements for courses in mountain medicine in August 1997 (Interlaken, Switzerland). Many course organizers adopted these standards and the Diploma in Mountain Medicine (DiMM) has become a widely respected qualification.The Medical Commission was founded in 1981. Its history dates back to an earlier time when there were only a few doctors representing the largest mountaineering federations. The commission has grown to include 22 delegated doctors from 18 different mountaineering federations, as well as 16 corresponding members from all over the world. The UIAA Medical Commission has worked very closely with the Medical Commission of the International Commission for Alpine Rescue (ICAR). The current presidents of the UIAA Medical commission and the MedCom ICAR are always on the advisory board of the ISMM.The UIAA is the world governing body for ice climbing competitions. The annual World Cup circuit and the bi annual World Championship and Youth World Championship are organised on different continents with athletes from over 30 countries participating.Ice climbingThe UIAA is the world governing body for ice climbing competitions. The annual UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup circuit and the bi annual World Championship and Youth World Championship are organized in different continents with athletes from over 30 countries participating.There are two ice climbing disciplines, Speed and Lead. In Speed, athletes race up an ice face for the best time. In Lead competitions the climbers' ability to master a difficult route in a given time is tested.Anti-Doping CommissionThe UIAA has adopted the World Anti-Doping Code (2014); this includes the mandatory articles of the Code and all relevant International Standards. The commission also oversees the anti-doping testing of athletes who participate in UIAA ice climbing competitions.Global Youth SummitThe Global Youth Summit is a series of UIAA youth events where young mountaineers from around the world come together to climb, promote peace and cooperation between countries and work on the protection of the environment. First implemented ten years ago, it consists of a series of expeditions and camps offered by UIAA member federations to other UIAA member federations and their members.All UIAA Global Youth Summit events are organised and undertaken in strict accordance with the relevant Federation's regulations and UIAA Youth Commission Handbook & UIAA Youth Commission criteria and recommendations governing such events. Once approved the National Federation or event organiser and their designated leaders have responsibility for the event. The UIAA Youth Commission and UIAA Office may on occasion appoint other responsible persons such as trainers, event organisers and partners.Source:Source:
|
[
"Pierre Bossus",
"Pietro Segantini",
"Charles Egmond d’Arcis",
"Jean Juge",
"Mike Mortimer",
"Albert Eggler",
"Alan Blackshaw",
"Edouard Wyss-Dunant",
"Carlo Sganzini",
"Frits Vrijlandt"
] |
|
Who was the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation in 06-Mar-199906-March-1999?
|
March 06, 1999
|
{
"text": [
"Ian McNaught-Davis"
]
}
|
L2_Q661178_P488_7
|
Albert Eggler is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1968 to Jan, 1972.
Ian McNaught-Davis is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1995 to Jan, 2004.
Edouard Wyss-Dunant is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1964 to Jan, 1968.
Charles Egmond d’Arcis is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1932 to Jan, 1964.
Jean Juge is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1972 to Jan, 1976.
Pierre Bossus is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1976 to Jan, 1984.
Carlo Sganzini is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1984 to Jan, 1989.
Pietro Segantini is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 1990 to Jan, 1995.
Frits Vrijlandt is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2020.
Alan Blackshaw is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2005.
Mike Mortimer is the chair of International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2011.
|
International Climbing and Mountaineering FederationThe International Climbing and Mountaineering Federation, commonly known by its French name Union Internationale des Associations d'Alpinisme (UIAA, lit. "International Union of Alpine Clubs") was founded in August 1932 in Chamonix, France when 20 mountaineering associations met for an alpine congress. Count Charles Egmond d’Arcis, from Switzerland, was chosen as the first president and it was decided by the founding members that the UIAA would be an international federation which would be in charge of the "study and solution of all problems regarding mountaineering". The UIAA Safety Label was created in 1960 and was internationally approved in 1965 and currently (2015) has a global presence on five continents with 86 member associations in 62 countries representing over 3 million people.The UIAA is today the international governing body of climbing and mountaineering and represents climbers and mountaineers around the world on a wide range of issues related to mountain safety, sustainability and competition sport.The International Climbers’ Meet, the goal of these meets is to foster good will and cultural understanding through our shared passion of climbing by hosting a diverse group of climbing abilities from a multitude of countries.The UIAA Safety Commission develops and maintains safety standards for climbing equipment. These standards are implemented worldwide by the manufacturers who also participate in annual Safety Commission meetings. The Commission works with nearly 60 manufacturers worldwide and has 1,861 products certified.Dynamic Rope UIAA fall count ratingThe test to determine the fall count uses a 5.1m rope and drops a weight (80 kg single rope / 55 kg double rope) so that it falls 4.8m before experiencing a reaction force from the rope. This means that the weight is falling below the fixed end and there is minimal rope to stretch and absorb the force. The fall count rating is the number of times the rope can undergo this test before breaking. For the dynamic rope to be UIAA certified it requires a fall count rating of 5 or more.This number does not indicate that the rope needs to be discarded after this many falls while climbing, since a fall would usually not have the climber fall beyond the belayer and there is usually more rope to stretch and absorb the fall. There has been no recorded accidents of a UIAA certified dynamic rope breaking without there being damage from a sharp edge or chemical.Mountain Medicine DiplomaTogether with the International Society of Mountain Medicine (ISMM) and the International Commission for Alpine Rescue (ICAR), the UIAA Medical Commission has established and developed a joint Diploma in Mountain Medicine that establishes minimal requirements for courses in mountain medicine in August 1997 (Interlaken, Switzerland). Many course organizers adopted these standards and the Diploma in Mountain Medicine (DiMM) has become a widely respected qualification.The Medical Commission was founded in 1981. Its history dates back to an earlier time when there were only a few doctors representing the largest mountaineering federations. The commission has grown to include 22 delegated doctors from 18 different mountaineering federations, as well as 16 corresponding members from all over the world. The UIAA Medical Commission has worked very closely with the Medical Commission of the International Commission for Alpine Rescue (ICAR). The current presidents of the UIAA Medical commission and the MedCom ICAR are always on the advisory board of the ISMM.The UIAA is the world governing body for ice climbing competitions. The annual World Cup circuit and the bi annual World Championship and Youth World Championship are organised on different continents with athletes from over 30 countries participating.Ice climbingThe UIAA is the world governing body for ice climbing competitions. The annual UIAA Ice Climbing World Cup circuit and the bi annual World Championship and Youth World Championship are organized in different continents with athletes from over 30 countries participating.There are two ice climbing disciplines, Speed and Lead. In Speed, athletes race up an ice face for the best time. In Lead competitions the climbers' ability to master a difficult route in a given time is tested.Anti-Doping CommissionThe UIAA has adopted the World Anti-Doping Code (2014); this includes the mandatory articles of the Code and all relevant International Standards. The commission also oversees the anti-doping testing of athletes who participate in UIAA ice climbing competitions.Global Youth SummitThe Global Youth Summit is a series of UIAA youth events where young mountaineers from around the world come together to climb, promote peace and cooperation between countries and work on the protection of the environment. First implemented ten years ago, it consists of a series of expeditions and camps offered by UIAA member federations to other UIAA member federations and their members.All UIAA Global Youth Summit events are organised and undertaken in strict accordance with the relevant Federation's regulations and UIAA Youth Commission Handbook & UIAA Youth Commission criteria and recommendations governing such events. Once approved the National Federation or event organiser and their designated leaders have responsibility for the event. The UIAA Youth Commission and UIAA Office may on occasion appoint other responsible persons such as trainers, event organisers and partners.Source:Source:
|
[
"Pierre Bossus",
"Pietro Segantini",
"Charles Egmond d’Arcis",
"Jean Juge",
"Mike Mortimer",
"Albert Eggler",
"Alan Blackshaw",
"Edouard Wyss-Dunant",
"Carlo Sganzini",
"Frits Vrijlandt"
] |
|
Which team did Daniele Delli Carri play for in Oct, 2002?
|
October 01, 2002
|
{
"text": [
"Torino F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q3701942_P54_5
|
Daniele Delli Carri plays for A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913 from Jan, 1988 to Jan, 1990.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924 from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S.D. Lucchese 1905 from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1992.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for ACF Fiorentina from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2005.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Genoa CFC from Jan, 1994 to Jan, 1996.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Robur Siena from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2004.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Piacenza Calcio from Jan, 1996 to Jan, 2000.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Italy national under-21 football team from Jan, 1993 to Jan, 1994.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Delfino Pescara 1936 from Jan, 2005 to Jan, 2007.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Torino F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2003.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Calcio Foggia 1920 from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
|
Daniele Delli CarriDaniele Delli Carri (born 18 September 1971) is a retired Italian footballer who played as a defender.His son Filippo Delli Carri is now a professional footballer.
|
[
"Robur Siena",
"A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913",
"S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924",
"Italy national under-21 football team",
"Calcio Foggia 1920",
"Genoa CFC",
"S.S.D. Lucchese 1905",
"ACF Fiorentina",
"Piacenza Calcio",
"Delfino Pescara 1936"
] |
|
Which team did Daniele Delli Carri play for in 2002-10-01?
|
October 01, 2002
|
{
"text": [
"Torino F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q3701942_P54_5
|
Daniele Delli Carri plays for A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913 from Jan, 1988 to Jan, 1990.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924 from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S.D. Lucchese 1905 from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1992.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for ACF Fiorentina from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2005.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Genoa CFC from Jan, 1994 to Jan, 1996.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Robur Siena from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2004.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Piacenza Calcio from Jan, 1996 to Jan, 2000.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Italy national under-21 football team from Jan, 1993 to Jan, 1994.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Delfino Pescara 1936 from Jan, 2005 to Jan, 2007.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Torino F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2003.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Calcio Foggia 1920 from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
|
Daniele Delli CarriDaniele Delli Carri (born 18 September 1971) is a retired Italian footballer who played as a defender.His son Filippo Delli Carri is now a professional footballer.
|
[
"Robur Siena",
"A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913",
"S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924",
"Italy national under-21 football team",
"Calcio Foggia 1920",
"Genoa CFC",
"S.S.D. Lucchese 1905",
"ACF Fiorentina",
"Piacenza Calcio",
"Delfino Pescara 1936"
] |
|
Which team did Daniele Delli Carri play for in 01/10/2002?
|
October 01, 2002
|
{
"text": [
"Torino F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q3701942_P54_5
|
Daniele Delli Carri plays for A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913 from Jan, 1988 to Jan, 1990.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924 from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S.D. Lucchese 1905 from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1992.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for ACF Fiorentina from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2005.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Genoa CFC from Jan, 1994 to Jan, 1996.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Robur Siena from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2004.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Piacenza Calcio from Jan, 1996 to Jan, 2000.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Italy national under-21 football team from Jan, 1993 to Jan, 1994.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Delfino Pescara 1936 from Jan, 2005 to Jan, 2007.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Torino F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2003.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Calcio Foggia 1920 from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
|
Daniele Delli CarriDaniele Delli Carri (born 18 September 1971) is a retired Italian footballer who played as a defender.His son Filippo Delli Carri is now a professional footballer.
|
[
"Robur Siena",
"A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913",
"S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924",
"Italy national under-21 football team",
"Calcio Foggia 1920",
"Genoa CFC",
"S.S.D. Lucchese 1905",
"ACF Fiorentina",
"Piacenza Calcio",
"Delfino Pescara 1936"
] |
|
Which team did Daniele Delli Carri play for in Oct 01, 2002?
|
October 01, 2002
|
{
"text": [
"Torino F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q3701942_P54_5
|
Daniele Delli Carri plays for A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913 from Jan, 1988 to Jan, 1990.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924 from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S.D. Lucchese 1905 from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1992.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for ACF Fiorentina from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2005.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Genoa CFC from Jan, 1994 to Jan, 1996.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Robur Siena from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2004.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Piacenza Calcio from Jan, 1996 to Jan, 2000.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Italy national under-21 football team from Jan, 1993 to Jan, 1994.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Delfino Pescara 1936 from Jan, 2005 to Jan, 2007.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Torino F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2003.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Calcio Foggia 1920 from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
|
Daniele Delli CarriDaniele Delli Carri (born 18 September 1971) is a retired Italian footballer who played as a defender.His son Filippo Delli Carri is now a professional footballer.
|
[
"Robur Siena",
"A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913",
"S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924",
"Italy national under-21 football team",
"Calcio Foggia 1920",
"Genoa CFC",
"S.S.D. Lucchese 1905",
"ACF Fiorentina",
"Piacenza Calcio",
"Delfino Pescara 1936"
] |
|
Which team did Daniele Delli Carri play for in 10/01/2002?
|
October 01, 2002
|
{
"text": [
"Torino F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q3701942_P54_5
|
Daniele Delli Carri plays for A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913 from Jan, 1988 to Jan, 1990.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924 from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S.D. Lucchese 1905 from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1992.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for ACF Fiorentina from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2005.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Genoa CFC from Jan, 1994 to Jan, 1996.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Robur Siena from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2004.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Piacenza Calcio from Jan, 1996 to Jan, 2000.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Italy national under-21 football team from Jan, 1993 to Jan, 1994.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Delfino Pescara 1936 from Jan, 2005 to Jan, 2007.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Torino F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2003.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Calcio Foggia 1920 from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
|
Daniele Delli CarriDaniele Delli Carri (born 18 September 1971) is a retired Italian footballer who played as a defender.His son Filippo Delli Carri is now a professional footballer.
|
[
"Robur Siena",
"A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913",
"S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924",
"Italy national under-21 football team",
"Calcio Foggia 1920",
"Genoa CFC",
"S.S.D. Lucchese 1905",
"ACF Fiorentina",
"Piacenza Calcio",
"Delfino Pescara 1936"
] |
|
Which team did Daniele Delli Carri play for in 01-Oct-200201-October-2002?
|
October 01, 2002
|
{
"text": [
"Torino F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q3701942_P54_5
|
Daniele Delli Carri plays for A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913 from Jan, 1988 to Jan, 1990.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924 from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for S.S.D. Lucchese 1905 from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1992.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for ACF Fiorentina from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2005.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Genoa CFC from Jan, 1994 to Jan, 1996.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Robur Siena from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2004.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Piacenza Calcio from Jan, 1996 to Jan, 2000.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Italy national under-21 football team from Jan, 1993 to Jan, 1994.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Delfino Pescara 1936 from Jan, 2005 to Jan, 2007.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Torino F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2003.
Daniele Delli Carri plays for Calcio Foggia 1920 from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
|
Daniele Delli CarriDaniele Delli Carri (born 18 September 1971) is a retired Italian footballer who played as a defender.His son Filippo Delli Carri is now a professional footballer.
|
[
"Robur Siena",
"A.S. Bisceglie Calcio 1913",
"S.S. Virtus Lanciano 1924",
"Italy national under-21 football team",
"Calcio Foggia 1920",
"Genoa CFC",
"S.S.D. Lucchese 1905",
"ACF Fiorentina",
"Piacenza Calcio",
"Delfino Pescara 1936"
] |
|
Which team did Juvhel Tsoumou play for in Apr, 2010?
|
April 28, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Alemannia Aachen"
]
}
|
L2_Q542784_P54_2
|
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Preston North End F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Hermannstadt from Jul, 2018 to Sep, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Waldhof Mannheim from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Plymouth Argyle F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Wacker Burghausen from Jan, 2015 to Jul, 2017.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Steaua București from Sep, 2019 to Dec, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C. from Feb, 2020 to Feb, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FK Senica from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2014.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Alemannia Aachen from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for TSV Hartberg from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2013.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Congo national football team from Sep, 2017 to Dec, 2022.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt II from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Viitorul Constanța from Feb, 2021 to Jul, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Ermis Aradippou FC from Jul, 2017 to Jul, 2018.
|
Juvhel TsoumouThe striker was raised in the Congolese capital Brazzaville where he showed his talent on sand pitches. As a 10-year-old, Tsoumou came with his mother, who was studying economics, to Zwickau, where he began to play in the youth system of FSV Zwickau.In 2003, Charly Körbel led him to the Eintracht Frankfurt football academy. Here he played until July 2006 before moving to the academy of Blackburn Rovers.After a season in England he returned to Eintracht because he saw a better future for himself at Frankfurt. On 4 September 2007, due to call-ups for the national youth team, Eintracht manager Friedhelm Funkel gave Tsoumou the chance to train with the first squad. For the Bundesliga match on 10 November 2007 against Borussia Dortmund the striker was in the squad for the first time. Youth Coordinator, Holger Mueller gave an interview on him and compared Tsoumou to Jermaine Jones due to his athleticism and ball-winning ability.Tsoumou debuted in the Bundesliga on 28 September 2008 against Arminia Bielefeld, when he was substituted in the 74th minute for Nikos Liberopoulos. Since making his debut, Tsoumou moved to the reserves where he was able to get more playing time and scored 5 in 29 appearance or spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad. On 20 March 2010, Tsuomou scored his first goal for Frankfurt in the 87th minute to equalise against Bayern Munich but Martin Fenin scored a winning goal in a 2–1 win.He signed a contract with Alemannia Aachen on 4 August 2010. On 20 August 2010, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Union Berlin. However, Tsoumou, once again, was not able as he spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad or moved to the reserves.In 2011, he had a trial spell at Sheffield Wednesday.After a successful trial, Tsoumou signed a two-year deal with Preston North End. On 4 October 2011, he scored his first goal for Preston against Morecambe in the Johnstones Paint Trophy. Preston went on to win 7–6 on penalties after the game had finished 2–2. He scored his first goal in English football against Huddersfield Town with a tap in from Iain Hume's cross. He then scored in Preston's next two fixtures against Oldham Athletic and AFC Bournemouth respectively. However under new manager Graham Westley, Tsoumou struggled to get playing time.He was transfer listed by the club along with six other player in May 2012 in order for Westley to strengthen the Preston squad.On 3 July 2012, his contract was cancelled by mutual consent despite having one year left on his contract.On 31 January 2012, Tsoumou joined League Two side Plymouth Argyle on loan along with Alex MacDonald, until the end of the season. His move to Plymouth delighted manager Carl Fletcher. On 4 February 2012, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Southend United. On 31 March 2012, he scored his first goal for the club in a 1–0 win over Bradford City which was a winning goal. On 5 May 2012, in the last game of the season, Tsoumou scored Plymouth's only goal in the match against Cheltenham Town which Plymouth lost.On 13 September 2012, Tsoumou signed with Austrian club TSV Hartberg.On 29 August 2013, he signed a two-year contract with FK Senica, following a free transfer. However his contract was cancelled and Tsoumou was released as a free agent on 1 January 2014.Tsoumou remained unattached until 14 November 2014 when he joined SV Waldhof Mannheim. He made 17 appearances, almost all from the bench, scoring 1 goal. He was released at the end of the 2014–15 Regionalliga season.Tsoumou joined SV Wacker Burghausen on 3 September 2015.Tsoumou joined FCSB on 12 September 2019.Juvhel Tsoumou has been capped by Germany at under-18 and under-19 level. He made two appearances for the under-18s against France in March 2008. Tsoumou made his under-19 debut against England in November 2008, replacing Taner Yalçın as a second-half substitute.He was pre-selected by Congo on 19 May 2017. Tsoumou made his debut for the Congo national football team in a 1-1 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification tie with Ghana on 1 September 2017.
|
[
"SV Waldhof Mannheim",
"Congo national football team",
"TSV Hartberg",
"FK Senica",
"Ermis Aradippou FC",
"Eintracht Frankfurt II",
"Plymouth Argyle F.C.",
"Eintracht Frankfurt",
"SV Wacker Burghausen",
"FC Hermannstadt",
"Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C.",
"FC Viitorul Constanța",
"FC Steaua București",
"Preston North End F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Juvhel Tsoumou play for in 2010-04-28?
|
April 28, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Alemannia Aachen"
]
}
|
L2_Q542784_P54_2
|
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Preston North End F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Hermannstadt from Jul, 2018 to Sep, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Waldhof Mannheim from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Plymouth Argyle F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Wacker Burghausen from Jan, 2015 to Jul, 2017.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Steaua București from Sep, 2019 to Dec, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C. from Feb, 2020 to Feb, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FK Senica from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2014.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Alemannia Aachen from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for TSV Hartberg from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2013.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Congo national football team from Sep, 2017 to Dec, 2022.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt II from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Viitorul Constanța from Feb, 2021 to Jul, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Ermis Aradippou FC from Jul, 2017 to Jul, 2018.
|
Juvhel TsoumouThe striker was raised in the Congolese capital Brazzaville where he showed his talent on sand pitches. As a 10-year-old, Tsoumou came with his mother, who was studying economics, to Zwickau, where he began to play in the youth system of FSV Zwickau.In 2003, Charly Körbel led him to the Eintracht Frankfurt football academy. Here he played until July 2006 before moving to the academy of Blackburn Rovers.After a season in England he returned to Eintracht because he saw a better future for himself at Frankfurt. On 4 September 2007, due to call-ups for the national youth team, Eintracht manager Friedhelm Funkel gave Tsoumou the chance to train with the first squad. For the Bundesliga match on 10 November 2007 against Borussia Dortmund the striker was in the squad for the first time. Youth Coordinator, Holger Mueller gave an interview on him and compared Tsoumou to Jermaine Jones due to his athleticism and ball-winning ability.Tsoumou debuted in the Bundesliga on 28 September 2008 against Arminia Bielefeld, when he was substituted in the 74th minute for Nikos Liberopoulos. Since making his debut, Tsoumou moved to the reserves where he was able to get more playing time and scored 5 in 29 appearance or spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad. On 20 March 2010, Tsuomou scored his first goal for Frankfurt in the 87th minute to equalise against Bayern Munich but Martin Fenin scored a winning goal in a 2–1 win.He signed a contract with Alemannia Aachen on 4 August 2010. On 20 August 2010, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Union Berlin. However, Tsoumou, once again, was not able as he spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad or moved to the reserves.In 2011, he had a trial spell at Sheffield Wednesday.After a successful trial, Tsoumou signed a two-year deal with Preston North End. On 4 October 2011, he scored his first goal for Preston against Morecambe in the Johnstones Paint Trophy. Preston went on to win 7–6 on penalties after the game had finished 2–2. He scored his first goal in English football against Huddersfield Town with a tap in from Iain Hume's cross. He then scored in Preston's next two fixtures against Oldham Athletic and AFC Bournemouth respectively. However under new manager Graham Westley, Tsoumou struggled to get playing time.He was transfer listed by the club along with six other player in May 2012 in order for Westley to strengthen the Preston squad.On 3 July 2012, his contract was cancelled by mutual consent despite having one year left on his contract.On 31 January 2012, Tsoumou joined League Two side Plymouth Argyle on loan along with Alex MacDonald, until the end of the season. His move to Plymouth delighted manager Carl Fletcher. On 4 February 2012, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Southend United. On 31 March 2012, he scored his first goal for the club in a 1–0 win over Bradford City which was a winning goal. On 5 May 2012, in the last game of the season, Tsoumou scored Plymouth's only goal in the match against Cheltenham Town which Plymouth lost.On 13 September 2012, Tsoumou signed with Austrian club TSV Hartberg.On 29 August 2013, he signed a two-year contract with FK Senica, following a free transfer. However his contract was cancelled and Tsoumou was released as a free agent on 1 January 2014.Tsoumou remained unattached until 14 November 2014 when he joined SV Waldhof Mannheim. He made 17 appearances, almost all from the bench, scoring 1 goal. He was released at the end of the 2014–15 Regionalliga season.Tsoumou joined SV Wacker Burghausen on 3 September 2015.Tsoumou joined FCSB on 12 September 2019.Juvhel Tsoumou has been capped by Germany at under-18 and under-19 level. He made two appearances for the under-18s against France in March 2008. Tsoumou made his under-19 debut against England in November 2008, replacing Taner Yalçın as a second-half substitute.He was pre-selected by Congo on 19 May 2017. Tsoumou made his debut for the Congo national football team in a 1-1 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification tie with Ghana on 1 September 2017.
|
[
"SV Waldhof Mannheim",
"Congo national football team",
"TSV Hartberg",
"FK Senica",
"Ermis Aradippou FC",
"Eintracht Frankfurt II",
"Plymouth Argyle F.C.",
"Eintracht Frankfurt",
"SV Wacker Burghausen",
"FC Hermannstadt",
"Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C.",
"FC Viitorul Constanța",
"FC Steaua București",
"Preston North End F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Juvhel Tsoumou play for in 28/04/2010?
|
April 28, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Alemannia Aachen"
]
}
|
L2_Q542784_P54_2
|
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Preston North End F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Hermannstadt from Jul, 2018 to Sep, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Waldhof Mannheim from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Plymouth Argyle F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Wacker Burghausen from Jan, 2015 to Jul, 2017.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Steaua București from Sep, 2019 to Dec, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C. from Feb, 2020 to Feb, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FK Senica from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2014.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Alemannia Aachen from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for TSV Hartberg from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2013.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Congo national football team from Sep, 2017 to Dec, 2022.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt II from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Viitorul Constanța from Feb, 2021 to Jul, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Ermis Aradippou FC from Jul, 2017 to Jul, 2018.
|
Juvhel TsoumouThe striker was raised in the Congolese capital Brazzaville where he showed his talent on sand pitches. As a 10-year-old, Tsoumou came with his mother, who was studying economics, to Zwickau, where he began to play in the youth system of FSV Zwickau.In 2003, Charly Körbel led him to the Eintracht Frankfurt football academy. Here he played until July 2006 before moving to the academy of Blackburn Rovers.After a season in England he returned to Eintracht because he saw a better future for himself at Frankfurt. On 4 September 2007, due to call-ups for the national youth team, Eintracht manager Friedhelm Funkel gave Tsoumou the chance to train with the first squad. For the Bundesliga match on 10 November 2007 against Borussia Dortmund the striker was in the squad for the first time. Youth Coordinator, Holger Mueller gave an interview on him and compared Tsoumou to Jermaine Jones due to his athleticism and ball-winning ability.Tsoumou debuted in the Bundesliga on 28 September 2008 against Arminia Bielefeld, when he was substituted in the 74th minute for Nikos Liberopoulos. Since making his debut, Tsoumou moved to the reserves where he was able to get more playing time and scored 5 in 29 appearance or spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad. On 20 March 2010, Tsuomou scored his first goal for Frankfurt in the 87th minute to equalise against Bayern Munich but Martin Fenin scored a winning goal in a 2–1 win.He signed a contract with Alemannia Aachen on 4 August 2010. On 20 August 2010, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Union Berlin. However, Tsoumou, once again, was not able as he spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad or moved to the reserves.In 2011, he had a trial spell at Sheffield Wednesday.After a successful trial, Tsoumou signed a two-year deal with Preston North End. On 4 October 2011, he scored his first goal for Preston against Morecambe in the Johnstones Paint Trophy. Preston went on to win 7–6 on penalties after the game had finished 2–2. He scored his first goal in English football against Huddersfield Town with a tap in from Iain Hume's cross. He then scored in Preston's next two fixtures against Oldham Athletic and AFC Bournemouth respectively. However under new manager Graham Westley, Tsoumou struggled to get playing time.He was transfer listed by the club along with six other player in May 2012 in order for Westley to strengthen the Preston squad.On 3 July 2012, his contract was cancelled by mutual consent despite having one year left on his contract.On 31 January 2012, Tsoumou joined League Two side Plymouth Argyle on loan along with Alex MacDonald, until the end of the season. His move to Plymouth delighted manager Carl Fletcher. On 4 February 2012, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Southend United. On 31 March 2012, he scored his first goal for the club in a 1–0 win over Bradford City which was a winning goal. On 5 May 2012, in the last game of the season, Tsoumou scored Plymouth's only goal in the match against Cheltenham Town which Plymouth lost.On 13 September 2012, Tsoumou signed with Austrian club TSV Hartberg.On 29 August 2013, he signed a two-year contract with FK Senica, following a free transfer. However his contract was cancelled and Tsoumou was released as a free agent on 1 January 2014.Tsoumou remained unattached until 14 November 2014 when he joined SV Waldhof Mannheim. He made 17 appearances, almost all from the bench, scoring 1 goal. He was released at the end of the 2014–15 Regionalliga season.Tsoumou joined SV Wacker Burghausen on 3 September 2015.Tsoumou joined FCSB on 12 September 2019.Juvhel Tsoumou has been capped by Germany at under-18 and under-19 level. He made two appearances for the under-18s against France in March 2008. Tsoumou made his under-19 debut against England in November 2008, replacing Taner Yalçın as a second-half substitute.He was pre-selected by Congo on 19 May 2017. Tsoumou made his debut for the Congo national football team in a 1-1 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification tie with Ghana on 1 September 2017.
|
[
"SV Waldhof Mannheim",
"Congo national football team",
"TSV Hartberg",
"FK Senica",
"Ermis Aradippou FC",
"Eintracht Frankfurt II",
"Plymouth Argyle F.C.",
"Eintracht Frankfurt",
"SV Wacker Burghausen",
"FC Hermannstadt",
"Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C.",
"FC Viitorul Constanța",
"FC Steaua București",
"Preston North End F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Juvhel Tsoumou play for in Apr 28, 2010?
|
April 28, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Alemannia Aachen"
]
}
|
L2_Q542784_P54_2
|
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Preston North End F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Hermannstadt from Jul, 2018 to Sep, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Waldhof Mannheim from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Plymouth Argyle F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Wacker Burghausen from Jan, 2015 to Jul, 2017.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Steaua București from Sep, 2019 to Dec, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C. from Feb, 2020 to Feb, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FK Senica from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2014.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Alemannia Aachen from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for TSV Hartberg from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2013.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Congo national football team from Sep, 2017 to Dec, 2022.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt II from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Viitorul Constanța from Feb, 2021 to Jul, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Ermis Aradippou FC from Jul, 2017 to Jul, 2018.
|
Juvhel TsoumouThe striker was raised in the Congolese capital Brazzaville where he showed his talent on sand pitches. As a 10-year-old, Tsoumou came with his mother, who was studying economics, to Zwickau, where he began to play in the youth system of FSV Zwickau.In 2003, Charly Körbel led him to the Eintracht Frankfurt football academy. Here he played until July 2006 before moving to the academy of Blackburn Rovers.After a season in England he returned to Eintracht because he saw a better future for himself at Frankfurt. On 4 September 2007, due to call-ups for the national youth team, Eintracht manager Friedhelm Funkel gave Tsoumou the chance to train with the first squad. For the Bundesliga match on 10 November 2007 against Borussia Dortmund the striker was in the squad for the first time. Youth Coordinator, Holger Mueller gave an interview on him and compared Tsoumou to Jermaine Jones due to his athleticism and ball-winning ability.Tsoumou debuted in the Bundesliga on 28 September 2008 against Arminia Bielefeld, when he was substituted in the 74th minute for Nikos Liberopoulos. Since making his debut, Tsoumou moved to the reserves where he was able to get more playing time and scored 5 in 29 appearance or spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad. On 20 March 2010, Tsuomou scored his first goal for Frankfurt in the 87th minute to equalise against Bayern Munich but Martin Fenin scored a winning goal in a 2–1 win.He signed a contract with Alemannia Aachen on 4 August 2010. On 20 August 2010, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Union Berlin. However, Tsoumou, once again, was not able as he spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad or moved to the reserves.In 2011, he had a trial spell at Sheffield Wednesday.After a successful trial, Tsoumou signed a two-year deal with Preston North End. On 4 October 2011, he scored his first goal for Preston against Morecambe in the Johnstones Paint Trophy. Preston went on to win 7–6 on penalties after the game had finished 2–2. He scored his first goal in English football against Huddersfield Town with a tap in from Iain Hume's cross. He then scored in Preston's next two fixtures against Oldham Athletic and AFC Bournemouth respectively. However under new manager Graham Westley, Tsoumou struggled to get playing time.He was transfer listed by the club along with six other player in May 2012 in order for Westley to strengthen the Preston squad.On 3 July 2012, his contract was cancelled by mutual consent despite having one year left on his contract.On 31 January 2012, Tsoumou joined League Two side Plymouth Argyle on loan along with Alex MacDonald, until the end of the season. His move to Plymouth delighted manager Carl Fletcher. On 4 February 2012, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Southend United. On 31 March 2012, he scored his first goal for the club in a 1–0 win over Bradford City which was a winning goal. On 5 May 2012, in the last game of the season, Tsoumou scored Plymouth's only goal in the match against Cheltenham Town which Plymouth lost.On 13 September 2012, Tsoumou signed with Austrian club TSV Hartberg.On 29 August 2013, he signed a two-year contract with FK Senica, following a free transfer. However his contract was cancelled and Tsoumou was released as a free agent on 1 January 2014.Tsoumou remained unattached until 14 November 2014 when he joined SV Waldhof Mannheim. He made 17 appearances, almost all from the bench, scoring 1 goal. He was released at the end of the 2014–15 Regionalliga season.Tsoumou joined SV Wacker Burghausen on 3 September 2015.Tsoumou joined FCSB on 12 September 2019.Juvhel Tsoumou has been capped by Germany at under-18 and under-19 level. He made two appearances for the under-18s against France in March 2008. Tsoumou made his under-19 debut against England in November 2008, replacing Taner Yalçın as a second-half substitute.He was pre-selected by Congo on 19 May 2017. Tsoumou made his debut for the Congo national football team in a 1-1 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification tie with Ghana on 1 September 2017.
|
[
"SV Waldhof Mannheim",
"Congo national football team",
"TSV Hartberg",
"FK Senica",
"Ermis Aradippou FC",
"Eintracht Frankfurt II",
"Plymouth Argyle F.C.",
"Eintracht Frankfurt",
"SV Wacker Burghausen",
"FC Hermannstadt",
"Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C.",
"FC Viitorul Constanța",
"FC Steaua București",
"Preston North End F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Juvhel Tsoumou play for in 04/28/2010?
|
April 28, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Alemannia Aachen"
]
}
|
L2_Q542784_P54_2
|
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Preston North End F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Hermannstadt from Jul, 2018 to Sep, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Waldhof Mannheim from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Plymouth Argyle F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Wacker Burghausen from Jan, 2015 to Jul, 2017.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Steaua București from Sep, 2019 to Dec, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C. from Feb, 2020 to Feb, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FK Senica from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2014.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Alemannia Aachen from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for TSV Hartberg from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2013.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Congo national football team from Sep, 2017 to Dec, 2022.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt II from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Viitorul Constanța from Feb, 2021 to Jul, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Ermis Aradippou FC from Jul, 2017 to Jul, 2018.
|
Juvhel TsoumouThe striker was raised in the Congolese capital Brazzaville where he showed his talent on sand pitches. As a 10-year-old, Tsoumou came with his mother, who was studying economics, to Zwickau, where he began to play in the youth system of FSV Zwickau.In 2003, Charly Körbel led him to the Eintracht Frankfurt football academy. Here he played until July 2006 before moving to the academy of Blackburn Rovers.After a season in England he returned to Eintracht because he saw a better future for himself at Frankfurt. On 4 September 2007, due to call-ups for the national youth team, Eintracht manager Friedhelm Funkel gave Tsoumou the chance to train with the first squad. For the Bundesliga match on 10 November 2007 against Borussia Dortmund the striker was in the squad for the first time. Youth Coordinator, Holger Mueller gave an interview on him and compared Tsoumou to Jermaine Jones due to his athleticism and ball-winning ability.Tsoumou debuted in the Bundesliga on 28 September 2008 against Arminia Bielefeld, when he was substituted in the 74th minute for Nikos Liberopoulos. Since making his debut, Tsoumou moved to the reserves where he was able to get more playing time and scored 5 in 29 appearance or spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad. On 20 March 2010, Tsuomou scored his first goal for Frankfurt in the 87th minute to equalise against Bayern Munich but Martin Fenin scored a winning goal in a 2–1 win.He signed a contract with Alemannia Aachen on 4 August 2010. On 20 August 2010, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Union Berlin. However, Tsoumou, once again, was not able as he spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad or moved to the reserves.In 2011, he had a trial spell at Sheffield Wednesday.After a successful trial, Tsoumou signed a two-year deal with Preston North End. On 4 October 2011, he scored his first goal for Preston against Morecambe in the Johnstones Paint Trophy. Preston went on to win 7–6 on penalties after the game had finished 2–2. He scored his first goal in English football against Huddersfield Town with a tap in from Iain Hume's cross. He then scored in Preston's next two fixtures against Oldham Athletic and AFC Bournemouth respectively. However under new manager Graham Westley, Tsoumou struggled to get playing time.He was transfer listed by the club along with six other player in May 2012 in order for Westley to strengthen the Preston squad.On 3 July 2012, his contract was cancelled by mutual consent despite having one year left on his contract.On 31 January 2012, Tsoumou joined League Two side Plymouth Argyle on loan along with Alex MacDonald, until the end of the season. His move to Plymouth delighted manager Carl Fletcher. On 4 February 2012, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Southend United. On 31 March 2012, he scored his first goal for the club in a 1–0 win over Bradford City which was a winning goal. On 5 May 2012, in the last game of the season, Tsoumou scored Plymouth's only goal in the match against Cheltenham Town which Plymouth lost.On 13 September 2012, Tsoumou signed with Austrian club TSV Hartberg.On 29 August 2013, he signed a two-year contract with FK Senica, following a free transfer. However his contract was cancelled and Tsoumou was released as a free agent on 1 January 2014.Tsoumou remained unattached until 14 November 2014 when he joined SV Waldhof Mannheim. He made 17 appearances, almost all from the bench, scoring 1 goal. He was released at the end of the 2014–15 Regionalliga season.Tsoumou joined SV Wacker Burghausen on 3 September 2015.Tsoumou joined FCSB on 12 September 2019.Juvhel Tsoumou has been capped by Germany at under-18 and under-19 level. He made two appearances for the under-18s against France in March 2008. Tsoumou made his under-19 debut against England in November 2008, replacing Taner Yalçın as a second-half substitute.He was pre-selected by Congo on 19 May 2017. Tsoumou made his debut for the Congo national football team in a 1-1 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification tie with Ghana on 1 September 2017.
|
[
"SV Waldhof Mannheim",
"Congo national football team",
"TSV Hartberg",
"FK Senica",
"Ermis Aradippou FC",
"Eintracht Frankfurt II",
"Plymouth Argyle F.C.",
"Eintracht Frankfurt",
"SV Wacker Burghausen",
"FC Hermannstadt",
"Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C.",
"FC Viitorul Constanța",
"FC Steaua București",
"Preston North End F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Juvhel Tsoumou play for in 28-Apr-201028-April-2010?
|
April 28, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Alemannia Aachen"
]
}
|
L2_Q542784_P54_2
|
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Preston North End F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Hermannstadt from Jul, 2018 to Sep, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Waldhof Mannheim from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Plymouth Argyle F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2012.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for SV Wacker Burghausen from Jan, 2015 to Jul, 2017.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Steaua București from Sep, 2019 to Dec, 2019.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C. from Feb, 2020 to Feb, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FK Senica from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2014.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Alemannia Aachen from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for TSV Hartberg from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2013.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Congo national football team from Sep, 2017 to Dec, 2022.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Eintracht Frankfurt II from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for FC Viitorul Constanța from Feb, 2021 to Jul, 2021.
Juvhel Tsoumou plays for Ermis Aradippou FC from Jul, 2017 to Jul, 2018.
|
Juvhel TsoumouThe striker was raised in the Congolese capital Brazzaville where he showed his talent on sand pitches. As a 10-year-old, Tsoumou came with his mother, who was studying economics, to Zwickau, where he began to play in the youth system of FSV Zwickau.In 2003, Charly Körbel led him to the Eintracht Frankfurt football academy. Here he played until July 2006 before moving to the academy of Blackburn Rovers.After a season in England he returned to Eintracht because he saw a better future for himself at Frankfurt. On 4 September 2007, due to call-ups for the national youth team, Eintracht manager Friedhelm Funkel gave Tsoumou the chance to train with the first squad. For the Bundesliga match on 10 November 2007 against Borussia Dortmund the striker was in the squad for the first time. Youth Coordinator, Holger Mueller gave an interview on him and compared Tsoumou to Jermaine Jones due to his athleticism and ball-winning ability.Tsoumou debuted in the Bundesliga on 28 September 2008 against Arminia Bielefeld, when he was substituted in the 74th minute for Nikos Liberopoulos. Since making his debut, Tsoumou moved to the reserves where he was able to get more playing time and scored 5 in 29 appearance or spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad. On 20 March 2010, Tsuomou scored his first goal for Frankfurt in the 87th minute to equalise against Bayern Munich but Martin Fenin scored a winning goal in a 2–1 win.He signed a contract with Alemannia Aachen on 4 August 2010. On 20 August 2010, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Union Berlin. However, Tsoumou, once again, was not able as he spent time on the bench when he joined the first-team squad or moved to the reserves.In 2011, he had a trial spell at Sheffield Wednesday.After a successful trial, Tsoumou signed a two-year deal with Preston North End. On 4 October 2011, he scored his first goal for Preston against Morecambe in the Johnstones Paint Trophy. Preston went on to win 7–6 on penalties after the game had finished 2–2. He scored his first goal in English football against Huddersfield Town with a tap in from Iain Hume's cross. He then scored in Preston's next two fixtures against Oldham Athletic and AFC Bournemouth respectively. However under new manager Graham Westley, Tsoumou struggled to get playing time.He was transfer listed by the club along with six other player in May 2012 in order for Westley to strengthen the Preston squad.On 3 July 2012, his contract was cancelled by mutual consent despite having one year left on his contract.On 31 January 2012, Tsoumou joined League Two side Plymouth Argyle on loan along with Alex MacDonald, until the end of the season. His move to Plymouth delighted manager Carl Fletcher. On 4 February 2012, Tsoumou made his debut for the club in a 2–2 draw against Southend United. On 31 March 2012, he scored his first goal for the club in a 1–0 win over Bradford City which was a winning goal. On 5 May 2012, in the last game of the season, Tsoumou scored Plymouth's only goal in the match against Cheltenham Town which Plymouth lost.On 13 September 2012, Tsoumou signed with Austrian club TSV Hartberg.On 29 August 2013, he signed a two-year contract with FK Senica, following a free transfer. However his contract was cancelled and Tsoumou was released as a free agent on 1 January 2014.Tsoumou remained unattached until 14 November 2014 when he joined SV Waldhof Mannheim. He made 17 appearances, almost all from the bench, scoring 1 goal. He was released at the end of the 2014–15 Regionalliga season.Tsoumou joined SV Wacker Burghausen on 3 September 2015.Tsoumou joined FCSB on 12 September 2019.Juvhel Tsoumou has been capped by Germany at under-18 and under-19 level. He made two appearances for the under-18s against France in March 2008. Tsoumou made his under-19 debut against England in November 2008, replacing Taner Yalçın as a second-half substitute.He was pre-selected by Congo on 19 May 2017. Tsoumou made his debut for the Congo national football team in a 1-1 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification tie with Ghana on 1 September 2017.
|
[
"SV Waldhof Mannheim",
"Congo national football team",
"TSV Hartberg",
"FK Senica",
"Ermis Aradippou FC",
"Eintracht Frankfurt II",
"Plymouth Argyle F.C.",
"Eintracht Frankfurt",
"SV Wacker Burghausen",
"FC Hermannstadt",
"Liaoning Shenyang Urban F.C.",
"FC Viitorul Constanța",
"FC Steaua București",
"Preston North End F.C."
] |
|
Who was the head of Soviet Union in Mar, 1959?
|
March 18, 1959
|
{
"text": [
"Nikita Khrushchev"
]
}
|
L2_Q15180_P6_6
|
Nikolai Bulganin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1955 to Mar, 1958.
Nikolai Tikhonov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1980 to Sep, 1985.
Ivan Silayev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1991 to Dec, 1991.
Alexei Kosygin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1964 to Oct, 1980.
Valentin Pavlov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jan, 1991 to Aug, 1991.
Nikolai Ryzhkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1985 to Jan, 1991.
Georgy Malenkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1953 to Feb, 1955.
Alexei Rykov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1924 to Dec, 1930.
Vyacheslav Molotov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Dec, 1930 to May, 1941.
Joseph Stalin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from May, 1941 to Mar, 1953.
Nikita Khrushchev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1958 to Oct, 1964.
Vladimir Lenin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jul, 1923 to Jan, 1924.
|
Soviet UnionThe Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a socialist state that spanned most of Europe and Asia during its existence from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a federal union of multiple national republics; in practice its government and economy were highly centralized until its final years. The country was a one-party state prior to 1990 governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with Moscow as its capital within its largest and most populous republic, the Russian SFSR. Other major urban centers were Leningrad (Russian SFSR), Kiev (Ukrainian SSR), Minsk (Byelorussian SSR), Tashkent (Uzbek SSR), Alma-Ata (Kazakh SSR) and Novosibirsk (Russian SFSR). It was the largest country in the world, covering over , and spanning eleven time zones. The Soviet Union's five biomes were tundra, taiga, steppes, desert, and mountains. Its diverse population was officially known as the Soviet people.The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 when the Bolsheviks, headed by Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Provisional Government that had earlier replaced the monarchy of the Russian Empire. They established the Russian Soviet Republic, beginning a civil war between the Bolshevik Red Army and many anti-Bolshevik forces across the former Empire, among whom the largest faction was the White Guard, which engaged in violent anti-communist repression against the Bolsheviks and their worker and peasant supporters known as the White Terror. The Red Army expanded and helped local Bolsheviks take power, establishing soviets, repressing their political opponents and rebellious peasants through Red Terror. By 1922, the Bolsheviks had emerged victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian republics. The New Economic Policy (NEP), which was introduced by Lenin, led to a partial return of a free market and private property; this resulted in a period of economic recovery.Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power. Stalin suppressed all political opposition to his rule inside the Communist Party and inaugurated a command economy. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and forced collectivization, which led to significant economic growth, but also led to a man-made famine in 1932–1933 and expanded the Gulag labour camp system originally established in 1918. Stalin also fomented political paranoia and conducted the Great Purge to remove his actual and perceived opponents from the Party through mass arrests of military leaders, Communist Party members, and ordinary citizens alike, who were then sent to correctional labor camps or sentenced to death.On 23 August 1939, after unsuccessful efforts to form an anti-fascist alliance with Western powers, the Soviets signed the non-aggression agreement with Nazi Germany. After the start of World War II, the formally neutral Soviets invaded and annexed territories of several Eastern European states, including eastern Poland and the Baltic states. In June 1941 the Germans invaded, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the cost of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at intense battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin and won World War II in Europe on 9 May 1945. The territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged in 1947 as a result of a post-war Soviet dominance in Eastern Europe, where the Eastern Bloc confronted the Western Bloc that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949.Following Stalin's death in 1953, a period known as de-Stalinization and the Khrushchev Thaw occurred under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev. The country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took an early lead in the Space Race with the first ever satellite and the first human spaceflight and the first probe to land on another planet, Venus. In the 1970s, there was a brief "détente" of relations with the United States, but tensions resumed when the Soviet Union deployed troops in Afghanistan in 1979. The war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters.In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to further reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of "glasnost" and "perestroika". The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing economic stagnation. The Cold War ended during his tenure and in 1989, Warsaw Pact countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective Marxist-Leninist regimes. Strong nationalist and separatist movements broke out across the USSR. Gorbachev initiated a referendum—boycotted by the Baltic republics, Armenia, Georgia, and Moldova—which resulted in the majority of participating citizens voting in favor of preserving the Union as a renewed federation. In August 1991, a coup d'état was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a high-profile role in facing down the coup. The main result was the banning of the Communist Party. The republics led by Russia and Ukraine declared independence. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned. All the republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states. The Russian Federation (formerly the Russian SFSR) assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations and is recognized as its continued legal personality in world affairs.The USSR produced many significant social and technological achievements and innovations regarding military power. It boasted the world's second-largest economy and the largest standing military in the world. The USSR was recognized as one of the five nuclear weapons states. It was a founding permanent member of the United Nations Security Council as well as a member of the OSCE, the WFTU and the leading member of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the Warsaw Pact.Before its dissolution, the USSR had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II. Sometimes also called "Soviet Empire", it exercised its hegemony in Eastern Europe and worldwide with military and economic strength, proxy conflicts and influence in developing countries and funding of scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The word "soviet" is derived from the Russian word "sovet" (), meaning "council", "assembly", "advice", ultimately deriving from the proto-Slavic verbal stem of "vět-iti" ("to inform"), related to Slavic "věst" ("news"), English "wise", the root in "ad-vis-or" (which came to English through French), or the Dutch "weten" ("to know"; cf. "wetenschap" meaning "science"). The word "sovietnik" means "councillor".Some organizations in Russian history were called "council" (). In the Russian Empire, the State Council which functioned from 1810 to 1917 was referred to as a Council of Ministers after the revolt of 1905.During the Georgian Affair, Vladimir Lenin envisioned an expression of Great Russian ethnic chauvinism by Joseph Stalin and his supporters, calling for these nation-states to join Russia as semi-independent parts of a greater union which he initially named as the Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia (). Stalin initially resisted the proposal but ultimately accepted it, although with Lenin's agreement changed the name to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), albeit all the republics began as "socialist soviet" and did not change to the other order until 1936. In addition, in the national languages of several republics, the word "council" or "conciliar" in the respective language was only quite late changed to an adaptation of the Russian "soviet" and never in others, e.g. Ukraine."СССР" (in Latin alphabet: "SSSR") is the abbreviation of USSR in Russian. It is written in Cyrillic letters. The Soviets used the Cyrillic abbreviation so frequently that audiences worldwide became familiar with its meaning. Notably, both Cyrillic letters used have homoglyphic (but transliterally distinct) letters in Latin alphabets. Because of widespread familiarity with the Cyrillic abbreviation, Latin alphabet users in particular almost always use the Latin homoglyphs "C" and "P" (as opposed to the transliteral Latin letters "S" and "R") when rendering the USSR's native abbreviation.After "СССР", the most common short form names for the Soviet state in Russian were "Советский Союз" (transliteration: "Sovetskiy Soyuz") which literally means "Soviet Union", and also "Союз ССР" (transliteration: "Soyuz SSR") which, after compensating for grammatical differences, essentially translates to "Union of SSR's" in English.In the English language media, the state was referred to as the Soviet Union or the USSR. In other European languages, the locally translated short forms and abbreviations are usually used such as "Union soviétique" and "URSS" in French, or "Sowjetunion" and "UdSSR" in German. In the English-speaking world, the Soviet Union was also informally called Russia and its citizens Russians, although that was technically incorrect since Russia was only one of the republics. Such misapplications of the linguistic equivalents to the term "Russia" and its derivatives were frequent in other languages as well.The Soviet Union covered an area of over , and was the world's largest country, a status that is retained by its successor state, Russia. It covered a sixth of Earth's land surface, and its size was comparable to the continent of North America. Its western part in Europe accounted for a quarter of the country's area and was the cultural and economic center. The eastern part in Asia extended to the Pacific Ocean to the east and Afghanistan to the south, and, except some areas in Central Asia, was much less populous. It spanned over east to west across eleven time zones, and over north to south. It had five climate zones: tundra, taiga, steppes, desert and mountains.The Soviet Union, similarly to Russia, had the world's longest border, measuring over , or circumferences of Earth. Two-thirds of it was a coastline. The country bordered Afghanistan, China, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Hungary, Iran, Mongolia, North Korea, Norway, Poland, Romania, and Turkey from 1945 to 1991. The Bering Strait separated the country from the United States, while the La Pérouse Strait separated it from Japan.The Soviet Union's highest mountain was Communism Peak (now Ismoil Somoni Peak) in Tajik SSR, at . It also included most of the world's largest lakes; the Caspian Sea (shared with Iran), and Lake Baikal in Russia, the world's largest and deepest freshwater lake.Modern revolutionary activity in the Russian Empire began with the 1825 Decembrist revolt. Although serfdom was abolished in 1861, it was done on terms unfavorable to the peasants and served to encourage revolutionaries. A parliament—the State Duma—was established in 1906 after the Russian Revolution of 1905, but Tsar Nicholas II resisted attempts to move from absolute to a constitutional monarchy. Social unrest continued and was aggravated during World War I by military defeat and food shortages in major cities.A spontaneous popular uprising in Petrograd, in response to the wartime decay of Russia's economy and morale, culminated in the February Revolution and the toppling of Nicholas II and the imperial government in March 1917. The tsarist autocracy was replaced by the Russian Provisional Government, which intended to conduct elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly and to continue fighting on the side of the Entente in World War I.At the same time, workers' councils, known in Russian as "Soviets", sprang up across the country. The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, pushed for socialist revolution in the Soviets and on the streets. On 7 November 1917, the Red Guards stormed the Winter Palace in Petrograd, ending the rule of the Provisional Government and leaving all political power to the Soviets. This event would later be officially known in Soviet bibliographies as the Great October Socialist Revolution. In December, the Bolsheviks signed an armistice with the Central Powers, though by February 1918, fighting had resumed. In March, the Soviets ended involvement in the war and signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.A long and bloody Civil War ensued between the Reds and the Whites, starting in 1917 and ending in 1923 with the Reds' victory. It included foreign intervention, the execution of the former tsar and his family, and the famine of 1921, which killed about five million people. In March 1921, during a related conflict with Poland, the Peace of Riga was signed, splitting disputed territories in Belarus and Ukraine between the Republic of Poland and Soviet Russia. Soviet Russia had to resolve similar conflicts with the newly established republics of Estonia, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania.On 28 December 1922, a conference of plenipotentiary delegations from the Russian SFSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR approved the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and the Declaration of the Creation of the USSR, forming the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. These two documents were confirmed by the first Congress of Soviets of the USSR and signed by the heads of the delegations, Mikhail Kalinin, Mikhail Tskhakaya, Mikhail Frunze, Grigory Petrovsky, and Alexander Chervyakov, on 30 December 1922. The formal proclamation was made from the stage of the Bolshoi Theatre.An intensive restructuring of the economy, industry and politics of the country began in the early days of Soviet power in 1917. A large part of this was done according to the Bolshevik Initial Decrees, government documents signed by Vladimir Lenin. One of the most prominent breakthroughs was the GOELRO plan, which envisioned a major restructuring of the Soviet economy based on total electrification of the country. The plan became the prototype for subsequent Five-Year Plans and was fulfilled by 1931. After the economic policy of "War communism" during the Russian Civil War, as a prelude to fully developing socialism in the country, the Soviet government permitted some private enterprise to coexist alongside nationalized industry in the 1920s, and total food requisition in the countryside was replaced by a food tax.From its creation, the government in the Soviet Union was based on the one-party rule of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks). The stated purpose was to prevent the return of capitalist exploitation, and that the principles of democratic centralism would be the most effective in representing the people's will in a practical manner. The debate over the future of the economy provided the background for a power struggle in the years after Lenin's death in 1924. Initially, Lenin was to be replaced by a "troika" consisting of Grigory Zinoviev of the Ukrainian SSR, Lev Kamenev of the Russian SFSR, and Joseph Stalin of the Transcaucasian SFSR.On 1 February 1924, the USSR was recognized by the United Kingdom. The same year, a Soviet Constitution was approved, legitimizing the December 1922 union. According to Archie Brown the constitution was never an accurate guide to political reality in the USSR. For example the fact that the Party played the leading role in making and enforcing policy was not mentioned in it until 1977. The USSR was a federative entity of many constituent republics, each with its own political and administrative entities. However, the term "Soviet Russia"strictly applicable only to the Russian Federative Socialist Republicwas often applied to the entire country by non-Soviet writers.On 3 April 1922, Stalin was named the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Lenin had appointed Stalin the head of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate, which gave Stalin considerable power. By gradually consolidating his influence and isolating and outmanoeuvring his rivals within the party, Stalin became the undisputed leader of the country and, by the end of the 1920s, established a totalitarian rule. In October 1927, Zinoviev and Leon Trotsky were expelled from the Central Committee and forced into exile.In 1928, Stalin introduced the first five-year plan for building a socialist economy. In place of the internationalism expressed by Lenin throughout the Revolution, it aimed to build Socialism in One Country. In industry, the state assumed control over all existing enterprises and undertook an intensive program of industrialization. In agriculture, rather than adhering to the "lead by example" policy advocated by Lenin, forced collectivization of farms was implemented all over the country.Famines ensued as a result, causing deaths estimated at three to seven million; surviving kulaks were persecuted, and many were sent to Gulags to do forced labor. Social upheaval continued in the mid-1930s. Despite the turmoil of the mid-to-late 1930s, the country developed a robust industrial economy in the years preceding World War II.Closer cooperation between the USSR and the West developed in the early 1930s. From 1932 to 1934, the country participated in the World Disarmament Conference. In 1933, diplomatic relations between the United States and the USSR were established when in November, the newly elected President of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, chose to recognize Stalin's Communist government formally and negotiated a new trade agreement between the two countries. In September 1934, the country joined the League of Nations. After the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, the USSR actively supported the Republican forces against the Nationalists, who were supported by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany.In December 1936, Stalin unveiled a new constitution that was praised by supporters around the world as the most democratic constitution imaginable, though there was some skepticism. Stalin's Great Purge resulted in the detainment or execution of many "Old Bolsheviks" who had participated in the October Revolution with Lenin. According to declassified Soviet archives, the NKVD arrested more than one and a half million people in 1937 and 1938, of whom 681,692 were shot. Over those two years, there were an average of over one thousand executions a day.In 1939, after attempts to form a military alliance with Britain and France against Germany failed, the Soviet Union made a dramatic shift towards Nazi Germany. Almost a year after Britain and France had concluded the Munich Agreement with Germany, the Soviet Union made agreements with Germany as well, both militarily and economically during extensive talks. The two countries concluded the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and the German–Soviet Commercial Agreement in August 1939. The former made possible the Soviet occupation of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bessarabia, northern Bukovina, and eastern Poland, while the Soviets remained formally neutral. In late November, unable to coerce the Republic of Finland by diplomatic means into moving its border back from Leningrad, Stalin ordered the invasion of Finland. In the east, the Soviet military won several decisive victories during border clashes with the Empire of Japan in 1938 and 1939. However, in April 1941, the USSR signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact with Japan, recognizing the territorial integrity of Manchukuo, a Japanese puppet state.Germany broke the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 starting what was known in the USSR as the Great Patriotic War. The Red Army stopped the seemingly invincible German Army at the Battle of Moscow. The Battle of Stalingrad, which lasted from late 1942 to early 1943, dealt a severe blow to Germany from which they never fully recovered and became a turning point in the war. After Stalingrad, Soviet forces drove through Eastern Europe to Berlin before Germany surrendered in 1945. The German Army suffered 80% of its military deaths in the Eastern Front. Harry Hopkins, a close foreign policy advisor to Franklin D. Roosevelt, spoke on 10 August 1943 of the USSR's decisive role in the war.In the same year, the USSR, in fulfilment of its agreement with the Allies at the Yalta Conference, denounced the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1945 and invaded Manchukuo and other Japan-controlled territories on 9 August 1945. This conflict ended with a decisive Soviet victory, contributing to the unconditional surrender of Japan and the end of World War II.The USSR suffered greatly in the war, losing around 27 million people. Approximately 2.8 million Soviet POWs died of starvation, mistreatment, or executions in just eight months of 1941–42. During the war, the country together with the United States, the United Kingdom and China were considered the Big Four Allied powers, and later became the Four Policemen that formed the basis of the United Nations Security Council. It emerged as a superpower in the post-war period. Once denied diplomatic recognition by the Western world, the USSR had official relations with practically every country by the late 1940s. A member of the United Nations at its foundation in 1945, the country became one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, which gave it the right to veto any of its resolutions.During the immediate post-war period, the Soviet Union rebuilt and expanded its economy, while maintaining its strictly centralized control. It took effective control over most of the countries of Eastern Europe (except Yugoslavia and later Albania), turning them into satellite states. The USSR bound its satellite states in a military alliance, the Warsaw Pact, in 1955, and an economic organization, Council for Mutual Economic Assistance or Comecon, a counterpart to the European Economic Community (EEC), from 1949 to 1991. The USSR concentrated on its own recovery, seizing and transferring most of Germany's industrial plants, and it exacted war reparations from East Germany, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria using Soviet-dominated joint enterprises. It also instituted trading arrangements deliberately designed to favor the country. Moscow controlled the Communist parties that ruled the satellite states, and they followed orders from the Kremlin. Later, the Comecon supplied aid to the eventually victorious Communist Party of China, and its influence grew elsewhere in the world. Fearing its ambitions, the Soviet Union's wartime allies, the United Kingdom and the United States, became its enemies. In the ensuing Cold War, the two sides clashed indirectly in proxy wars.Stalin died on 5 March 1953. Without a mutually agreeable successor, the highest Communist Party officials initially opted to rule the Soviet Union jointly through a troika headed by Georgy Malenkov. This did not last, however, and Nikita Khrushchev eventually won the ensuing power struggle by the mid-1950s. In 1956, he denounced Joseph Stalin and proceeded to ease controls over the party and society. This was known as de-Stalinization.Moscow considered Eastern Europe to be a critically vital buffer zone for the forward defence of its western borders, in case of another major invasion such as the German invasion of 1941. For this reason, the USSR sought to cement its control of the region by transforming the Eastern European countries into satellite states, dependent upon and subservient to its leadership. As a result, Soviet military forces were used to suppress an anti-communist uprising in Hungary in 1956.In the late 1950s, a confrontation with China regarding the Soviet rapprochement with the West, and what Mao Zedong perceived as Khrushchev's revisionism, led to the Sino–Soviet split. This resulted in a break throughout the global Marxist–Leninist movement, with the governments in Albania, Cambodia and Somalia choosing to ally with China.During this period of the late 1950s and early 1960s, the USSR continued to realize scientific and technological exploits in the Space Race, rivaling the United States: launching the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1 in 1957; a living dog named Laika in 1957; the first human being, Yuri Gagarin in 1961; the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova in 1963; Alexei Leonov, the first person to walk in space in 1965; the first soft landing on the Moon by spacecraft Luna 9 in 1966; and the first Moon rovers, Lunokhod 1 and Lunokhod 2.Khrushchev initiated "The Thaw", a complex shift in political, cultural and economic life in the country. This included some openness and contact with other nations and new social and economic policies with more emphasis on commodity goods, allowing a dramatic rise in living standards while maintaining high levels of economic growth. Censorship was relaxed as well. Khrushchev's reforms in agriculture and administration, however, were generally unproductive. In 1962, he precipitated a crisis with the United States over the Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles in Cuba. An agreement was made with the United States to remove nuclear missiles from both Cuba and Turkey, concluding the crisis. This event caused Khrushchev much embarrassment and loss of prestige, resulting in his removal from power in 1964.Following the ousting of Khrushchev, another period of collective leadership ensued, consisting of Leonid Brezhnev as General Secretary, Alexei Kosygin as Premier and Nikolai Podgorny as Chairman of the Presidium, lasting until Brezhnev established himself in the early 1970s as the preeminent Soviet leader.In 1968, the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact allies invaded Czechoslovakia to halt the Prague Spring reforms. In the aftermath, Brezhnev justified the invasion and previous military interventions as well as any potential military interventions in the future by introducing the Brezhnev Doctrine, which proclaimed any threat to socialist rule in a Warsaw Pact state as a threat to all Warsaw Pact states, therefore justifying military intervention.Brezhnev presided throughout "détente" with the West that resulted in treaties on armament control (SALT I, SALT II, Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty) while at the same time building up Soviet military might.In October 1977, the third Soviet Constitution was unanimously adopted. The prevailing mood of the Soviet leadership at the time of Brezhnev's death in 1982 was one of aversion to change. The long period of Brezhnev's rule had come to be dubbed one of "standstill", with an ageing and ossified top political leadership. This period is also known as the Era of Stagnation, a period of adverse economic, political, and social effects in the country, which began during the rule of Brezhnev and continued under his successors Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko.In late 1979, the Soviet Union's military intervened in the ongoing civil war in neighboring Afghanistan, effectively ending a détente with the West.Two developments dominated the decade that followed: the increasingly apparent crumbling of the Soviet Union's economic and political structures, and the patchwork attempts at reforms to reverse that process. Kenneth S. Deffeyes argued in "Beyond Oil" that the Reagan administration encouraged Saudi Arabia to lower the price of oil to the point where the Soviets could not make a profit selling their oil, and resulted in the depletion of the country's hard currency reserves.Brezhnev's next two successors, transitional figures with deep roots in his tradition, did not last long. Yuri Andropov was 68 years old and Konstantin Chernenko 72 when they assumed power; both died in less than two years. In an attempt to avoid a third short-lived leader, in 1985, the Soviets turned to the next generation and selected Mikhail Gorbachev. He made significant changes in the economy and party leadership, called "perestroika". His policy of "glasnost" freed public access to information after decades of heavy government censorship. Gorbachev also moved to end the Cold War. In 1988, the USSR abandoned its war in Afghanistan and began to withdraw its forces. In the following year, Gorbachev refused to interfere in the internal affairs of the Soviet satellite states, which paved the way for the Revolutions of 1989. In particular, the standstill of the Soviet Union at the Pan-European Picnic in August 1989 then set a peaceful chain reaction in motion at the end of which the Eastern Bloc collapsed. With the tearing down of the Berlin Wall and with East and West Germany pursuing unification, the Iron Curtain between the West and Soviet-controlled regions came down.At the same time, the Soviet republics started legal moves towards potentially declaring sovereignty over their territories, citing the freedom to secede in Article 72 of the USSR constitution. On 7 April 1990, a law was passed allowing a republic to secede if more than two-thirds of its residents voted for it in a referendum. Many held their first free elections in the Soviet era for their own national legislatures in 1990. Many of these legislatures proceeded to produce legislation contradicting the Union laws in what was known as the "War of Laws". In 1989, the Russian SFSR convened a newly elected Congress of People's Deputies. Boris Yeltsin was elected its chairman. On 12 June 1990, the Congress declared Russia's sovereignty over its territory and proceeded to pass laws that attempted to supersede some of the Soviet laws. After a landslide victory of Sąjūdis in Lithuania, that country declared its independence restored on 11 March 1990.A referendum for the preservation of the USSR was held on 17 March 1991 in nine republics (the remainder having boycotted the vote), with the majority of the population in those republics voting for preservation of the Union. The referendum gave Gorbachev a minor boost. In the summer of 1991, the New Union Treaty, which would have turned the country into a much looser Union, was agreed upon by eight republics. The signing of the treaty, however, was interrupted by the August Coup—an attempted coup d'état by hardline members of the government and the KGB who sought to reverse Gorbachev's reforms and reassert the central government's control over the republics. After the coup collapsed, Yeltsin was seen as a hero for his decisive actions, while Gorbachev's power was effectively ended. The balance of power tipped significantly towards the republics. In August 1991, Latvia and Estonia immediately declared the restoration of their full independence (following Lithuania's 1990 example). Gorbachev resigned as general secretary in late August, and soon afterwards, the party's activities were indefinitely suspended—effectively ending its rule. By the fall, Gorbachev could no longer influence events outside Moscow, and he was being challenged even there by Yeltsin, who had been elected President of Russia in July 1991.The remaining 12 republics continued discussing new, increasingly looser, models of the Union. However, by December all except Russia and Kazakhstan had formally declared independence. During this time, Yeltsin took over what remained of the Soviet government, including the Moscow Kremlin. The final blow was struck on 1 December when Ukraine, the second-most powerful republic, voted overwhelmingly for independence. Ukraine's secession ended any realistic chance of the country staying together even on a limited scale.On 8 December 1991, the presidents of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus (formerly Byelorussia), signed the Belavezha Accords, which declared the Soviet Union dissolved and established the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in its place. While doubts remained over the authority of the accords to do this, on 21 December 1991, the representatives of all Soviet republics except Georgia signed the Alma-Ata Protocol, which confirmed the accords. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned as the President of the USSR, declaring the office extinct. He turned the powers that had been vested in the presidency over to Yeltsin. That night, the Soviet flag was lowered for the last time, and the Russian tricolor was raised in its place.The following day, the Supreme Soviet, the highest governmental body, voted both itself and the country out of existence. This is generally recognized as marking the official, final dissolution of the Soviet Union as a functioning state, and the end of the Cold War. The Soviet Army initially remained under overall CIS command but was soon absorbed into the different military forces of the newly independent states. The few remaining Soviet institutions that had not been taken over by Russia ceased to function by the end of 1991.Following the dissolution, Russia was internationally recognized as its legal successor on the international stage. To that end, Russia voluntarily accepted all Soviet foreign debt and claimed Soviet overseas properties as its own. Under the 1992 Lisbon Protocol, Russia also agreed to receive all nuclear weapons remaining in the territory of other former Soviet republics. Since then, the Russian Federation has assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations. Ukraine has refused to recognize exclusive Russian claims to succession of the USSR and claimed such status for Ukraine as well, which was codified in Articles 7 and 8 of its 1991 law On Legal Succession of Ukraine. Since its independence in 1991, Ukraine has continued to pursue claims against Russia in foreign courts, seeking to recover its share of the foreign property that was owned by the USSR.The dissolution was followed by a severe drop in economic and social conditions in post-Soviet states, including a rapid increase in poverty, crime, corruption, unemployment, homelessness, rates of disease, infant mortality and domestic violence, as well as demographic losses and income inequality and the rise of an oligarchical class, along with decreases in calorie intake, life expectancy, adult literacy, and income. Between 1988–1989 and 1993–1995, the Gini ratio increased by an average of 9 points for all former socialist countries. The economic shocks that accompanied wholesale privatization were associated with sharp increases in mortality. Data shows Russia, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia saw a tripling of unemployment and a 42% increase in male death rates between 1991 and 1994. In the following decades, only five or six of the post-communist states are on a path to joining the wealthy capitalist West while most are falling behind, some to such an extent that it will take over fifty years to catch up to where they were before the fall of the Soviet Bloc.In summing up the international ramifications of these events, Vladislav Zubok stated: "The collapse of the Soviet empire was an event of epochal geopolitical, military, ideological, and economic significance." Before the dissolution, the country had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, military strength, economic strength, aid to developing countries, and scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The analysis of the succession of states for the 15 post-Soviet states is complex. The Russian Federation is seen as the legal "continuator" state and is for most purposes the heir to the Soviet Union. It retained ownership of all former Soviet embassy properties, as well as the old Soviet UN membership and permanent membership on the Security Council.Of the two other co-founding states of the USSR at the time of the dissolution, Ukraine was the only one that had passed laws, similar to Russia, that it is a state-successor of both the Ukrainian SSR and the USSR. Soviet treaties laid groundwork for Ukraine's future foreign agreements as well as they led to Ukraine agreeing to undertake 16.37% of debts of the Soviet Union for which it was going to receive its share of USSR's foreign property. Although it had a tough position at the time, due to Russia's position as a "single continuation of the USSR" that became widely accepted in the West as well as a constant pressure from the Western countries, allowed Russia to dispose state property of USSR abroad and conceal information about it. Due to that Ukraine never ratified "zero option" agreement that Russian Federation had signed with other former Soviet republics, as it denied disclosing of information about Soviet Gold Reserves and its Diamond Fund. The dispute over former Soviet property and assets between the two former republics is still ongoing:Similar situation occurred with restitution of cultural property. Although on 14 February 1992 Russia and other former Soviet republics signed agreement "On the return of cultural and historic property to the origin states" in Minsk, it was halted by Russian State Duma that had eventually passed "Federal Law on Cultural Valuables Displaced to the USSR as a Result of the Second World War and Located on the Territory of the Russian Federation" which made restitution currently impossible.There are additionally four states that claim independence from the other internationally recognised post-Soviet states but possess limited international recognition: Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia and Transnistria. The Chechen separatist movement of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria lacks any international recognition.During his rule, Stalin always made the final policy decisions. Otherwise, Soviet foreign policy was set by the commission on the Foreign Policy of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, or by the party's highest body the Politburo. Operations were handled by the separate Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It was known as the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (or Narkomindel), until 1946. The most influential spokesmen were Georgy Chicherin (1872–1936), Maxim Litvinov (1876–1951), Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986), Andrey Vyshinsky (1883–1954) and Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989). Intellectuals were based in the Moscow State Institute of International Relations.The Marxist-Leninist leadership of the Soviet Union intensely debated foreign policy issues and change directions several times. Even after Stalin assumed dictatorial control in the late 1920s, there were debates, and he frequently changed positions.During the country's early period, it was assumed that Communist revolutions would break out soon in every major industrial country, and it was the Soviet responsibility to assist them. The Comintern was the weapon of choice. A few revolutions did break out, but they were quickly suppressed (the longest lasting one was in Hungary)—the Hungarian Soviet Republic—lasted only from 21 March 1919 to 1 August 1919. The Russian Bolsheviks were in no position to give any help.By 1921, Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin realized that capitalism had stabilized itself in Europe and there would not be any widespread revolutions anytime soon. It became the duty of the Russian Bolsheviks to protect what they had in Russia, and avoid military confrontations that might destroy their bridgehead. Russia was now a pariah state, along with Germany. The two came to terms in 1922 with the Treaty of Rapallo that settled long-standing grievances. At the same time, the two countries secretly set up training programs for the illegal German army and air force operations at hidden camps in the USSR.Moscow eventually stopped threatening other states, and instead worked to open peaceful relationships in terms of trade, and diplomatic recognition. The United Kingdom dismissed the warnings of Winston Churchill and a few others about a continuing Marxist-Leninist threat, and opened trade relations and "de facto" diplomatic recognition in 1922. There was hope for a settlement of the pre-war Tsarist debts, but it was repeatedly postponed. Formal recognition came when the new Labour Party came to power in 1924. All the other countries followed suit in opening trade relations. Henry Ford opened large-scale business relations with the Soviets in the late 1920s, hoping that it would lead to long-term peace. Finally, in 1933, the United States officially recognized the USSR, a decision backed by the public opinion and especially by US business interests that expected an opening of a new profitable market.In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Stalin ordered Marxist-Leninist parties across the world to strongly oppose non-Marxist political parties, labor unions or other organizations on the left. Stalin reversed himself in 1934 with the Popular Front program that called on all Marxist parties to join together with all anti-Fascist political, labor, and organizational forces that were opposed to fascism, especially of the Nazi variety.In 1939, half a year after the Munich Agreement, the USSR attempted to form an anti-Nazi alliance with France and Britain. Adolf Hitler proposed a better deal, which would give the USSR control over much of Eastern Europe through the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In September, Germany invaded Poland, and the USSR also invaded later that month, resulting in the partition of Poland. In response, Britain and France declared war on Germany, marking the beginning of World War II.There were three power hierarchies in the Soviet Union: the legislature represented by the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, the government represented by the Council of Ministers, and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), the only legal party and the final policymaker in the country.At the top of the Communist Party was the Central Committee, elected at Party Congresses and Conferences. In turn, the Central Committee voted for a Politburo (called the Presidium between 1952 and 1966), Secretariat and the General Secretary (First Secretary from 1953 to 1966), the "de facto" highest office in the Soviet Union. Depending on the degree of power consolidation, it was either the Politburo as a collective body or the General Secretary, who always was one of the Politburo members, that effectively led the party and the country (except for the period of the highly personalized authority of Stalin, exercised directly through his position in the Council of Ministers rather than the Politburo after 1941). They were not controlled by the general party membership, as the key principle of the party organization was democratic centralism, demanding strict subordination to higher bodies, and elections went uncontested, endorsing the candidates proposed from above.The Communist Party maintained its dominance over the state mainly through its control over the system of appointments. All senior government officials and most deputies of the Supreme Soviet were members of the CPSU. Of the party heads themselves, Stalin (1941–1953) and Khrushchev (1958–1964) were Premiers. Upon the forced retirement of Khrushchev, the party leader was prohibited from this kind of double membership, but the later General Secretaries for at least some part of their tenure occupied the mostly ceremonial position of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, the nominal head of state. The institutions at lower levels were overseen and at times supplanted by primary party organizations.However, in practice the degree of control the party was able to exercise over the state bureaucracy, particularly after the death of Stalin, was far from total, with the bureaucracy pursuing different interests that were at times in conflict with the party. Nor was the party itself monolithic from top to bottom, although factions were officially banned.The Supreme Soviet (successor of the Congress of Soviets) was nominally the highest state body for most of the Soviet history, at first acting as a rubber stamp institution, approving and implementing all decisions made by the party. However, its powers and functions were extended in the late 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, including the creation of new state commissions and committees. It gained additional powers relating to the approval of the Five-Year Plans and the government budget. The Supreme Soviet elected a Presidium (successor of the Central Executive Committee) to wield its power between plenary sessions, ordinarily held twice a year, and appointed the Supreme Court, the Procurator General and the Council of Ministers (known before 1946 as the Council of People's Commissars), headed by the Chairman (Premier) and managing an enormous bureaucracy responsible for the administration of the economy and society. State and party structures of the constituent republics largely emulated the structure of the central institutions, although the Russian SFSR, unlike the other constituent republics, for most of its history had no republican branch of the CPSU, being ruled directly by the union-wide party until 1990. Local authorities were organized likewise into party committees, local Soviets and executive committees. While the state system was nominally federal, the party was unitary.The state security police (the KGB and ) played an important role in Soviet politics. It was instrumental in the Great Purge, but was brought under strict party control after Stalin's death. Under Yuri Andropov, the KGB engaged in the suppression of political dissent and maintained an extensive network of informers, reasserting itself as a political actor to some extent independent of the party-state structure, culminating in the anti-corruption campaign targeting high-ranking party officials in the late 1970s and early 1980s.The constitution, which was promulgated in 1924, 1936 and 1977, did not limit state power. No formal separation of powers existed between the Party, Supreme Soviet and Council of Ministers that represented executive and legislative branches of the government. The system was governed less by statute than by informal conventions, and no settled mechanism of leadership succession existed. Bitter and at times deadly power struggles took place in the Politburo after the deaths of Lenin and Stalin, as well as after Khrushchev's dismissal, itself due to a decision by both the Politburo and the Central Committee. All leaders of the Communist Party before Gorbachev died in office, except Georgy Malenkov and Khrushchev, both dismissed from the party leadership amid internal struggle within the party.Between 1988 and 1990, facing considerable opposition, Mikhail Gorbachev enacted reforms shifting power away from the highest bodies of the party and making the Supreme Soviet less dependent on them. The Congress of People's Deputies was established, the majority of whose members were directly elected in competitive elections held in March 1989. The Congress now elected the Supreme Soviet, which became a full-time parliament, and much stronger than before. For the first time since the 1920s, it refused to rubber stamp proposals from the party and Council of Ministers. In 1990, Gorbachev introduced and assumed the position of the President of the Soviet Union, concentrated power in his executive office, independent of the party, and subordinated the government, now renamed the Cabinet of Ministers of the USSR, to himself.Tensions grew between the Union-wide authorities under Gorbachev, reformists led in Russia by Boris Yeltsin and controlling the newly elected Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR, and communist hardliners. On 19–21 August 1991, a group of hardliners staged a coup attempt. The coup failed, and the State Council of the Soviet Union became the highest organ of state power "in the period of transition". Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary, only remaining President for the final months of the existence of the USSR.The judiciary was not independent of the other branches of government. The Supreme Court supervised the lower courts (People's Court) and applied the law as established by the constitution or as interpreted by the Supreme Soviet. The Constitutional Oversight Committee reviewed the constitutionality of laws and acts. The Soviet Union used the inquisitorial system of Roman law, where the judge, procurator, and defence attorney collaborate to establish the truth.Constitutionally, the USSR was a federation of constituent Union Republics, which were either unitary states, such as Ukraine or Byelorussia (SSRs), or federations, such as Russia or Transcaucasia (SFSRs), all four being the founding republics who signed the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR in December 1922. In 1924, during the national delimitation in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were formed from parts of Russia's Turkestan ASSR and two Soviet dependencies, the Khorezm and Bukharan SSRs. In 1929, Tajikistan was split off from the Uzbekistan SSR. With the constitution of 1936, the Transcaucasian SFSR was dissolved, resulting in its constituent republics of Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan being elevated to Union Republics, while Kazakhstan and Kirghizia were split off from Russian SFSR, resulting in the same status. In August 1940, Moldavia was formed from parts of Ukraine and Bessarabia and northern Bukovina. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (SSRs) were also admitted into the union which was not recognized by most of the international community and was considered an illegal occupation. Karelia was split off from Russia as a Union Republic in March 1940 and was reabsorbed in 1956. Between July 1956 and September 1991, there were 15 union republics (see map below).While nominally a union of equals, in practice the Soviet Union was dominated by Russians. The domination was so absolute that for most of its existence, the country was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to as "Russia". While the RSFSR was technically only one republic within the larger union, it was by far the largest (both in terms of population and area), most powerful, most developed, and the industrial center of the Soviet Union. Historian Matthew White wrote that it was an open secret that the country's federal structure was "window dressing" for Russian dominance. For that reason, the people of the USSR were usually called "Russians", not "Soviets", since "everyone knew who really ran the show".Under the Military Law of September 1925, the Soviet Armed Forces consisted of the Land Forces, the Air Force, the Navy, Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU), and the Internal Troops. The OGPU later became independent and in 1934 joined the NKVD, and so its internal troops were under the joint leadership of the defense and internal commissariats. After World War II, Strategic Missile Forces (1959), Air Defense Forces (1948) and National Civil Defense Forces (1970) were formed, which ranked first, third, and sixth in the official Soviet system of importance (ground forces were second, Air Force Fourth, and Navy Fifth).The army had the greatest political influence. In 1989, there served two million soldiers divided between 150 motorized and 52 armored divisions. Until the early 1960s, the Soviet navy was a rather small military branch, but after the Caribbean crisis, under the leadership of Sergei Gorshkov, it expanded significantly. It became known for battlecruisers and submarines. In 1989 there served 500 000 men. The Soviet Air Force focused on a fleet of strategic bombers and during war situation was to eradicate enemy infrastructure and nuclear capacity. The air force also had a number of fighters and tactical bombers to support the army in the war. Strategic missile forces had more than 1,400 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), deployed between 28 bases and 300 command centers.In the post-war period, the Soviet Army was directly involved in several military operations abroad. These included the suppression of the uprising in East Germany (1953), Hungarian revolution (1956) and the invasion of Czechoslovakia (1968). The Soviet Union also participated in the war in Afghanistan between 1979 and 1989.In the Soviet Union, general conscription applied.At the end of the 1950s, with the help of engineers and technologies captured and imported from defeated Nazi Germany, the Soviets constructed the first satellite – Sputnik 1 and thus overtook the United States in terms of utilizing space. This was followed by other successful satellites, where test dogs flight was sent. On April 12, 1961, the first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, was sent to the space. He once flew around the Earth and successfully landed in the Kazakh steppe. At that time, the first plans for space shuttles and orbital stations were drawn up in Soviet design offices, but in the end personal disputes between designers and management prevented this.As for Lunar space program; USSR only had a program on automated spacecraft launches; with no manned spacecraft used; passing on the "Moon Race" part of Space Race.In the 1970s, specific proposals for the design of the space shuttle began to emerge, but shortcomings, especially in the electronics industry (rapid overheating of electronics), postponed the program until the end of the 1980s. The first shuttle, the Buran, flew in 1988, but without a human crew. Another shuttle, "Ptichka", eventually ended up under construction, as the shuttle project was canceled in 1991. For their launch into space, there is today an unused superpower rocket, Energia, which is the most powerful in the world.In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union managed to build the "Mir" orbital station. It was built on the construction of "Salyut" stations and its only role was civilian-grade research tasks. The Soviet Union adopted a command economy, whereby production and distribution of goods were centralized and directed by the government. The first Bolshevik experience with a command economy was the policy of War communism, which involved the nationalization of industry, centralized distribution of output, coercive requisition of agricultural production, and attempts to eliminate money circulation, private enterprises and free trade. After the severe economic collapse, Lenin replaced war communism by the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1921, legalizing free trade and private ownership of small businesses. The economy quickly recovered as a result.After a long debate among the members of the Politburo about the course of economic development, by 1928–1929, upon gaining control of the country, Stalin abandoned the NEP and pushed for full central planning, starting forced collectivization of agriculture and enacting draconian labor legislation. Resources were mobilized for rapid industrialization, which significantly expanded Soviet capacity in heavy industry and capital goods during the 1930s. The primary motivation for industrialization was preparation for war, mostly due to distrust of the outside capitalist world. As a result, the USSR was transformed from a largely agrarian economy into a great industrial power, leading the way for its emergence as a superpower after World War II. The war caused extensive devastation of the Soviet economy and infrastructure, which required massive reconstruction.By the early 1940s, the Soviet economy had become relatively self-sufficient; for most of the period until the creation of Comecon, only a tiny share of domestic products was traded internationally. After the creation of the Eastern Bloc, external trade rose rapidly. However, the influence of the world economy on the USSR was limited by fixed domestic prices and a state monopoly on foreign trade. Grain and sophisticated consumer manufactures became major import articles from around the 1960s. During the arms race of the Cold War, the Soviet economy was burdened by military expenditures, heavily lobbied for by a powerful bureaucracy dependent on the arms industry. At the same time, the USSR became the largest arms exporter to the Third World. Significant amounts of Soviet resources during the Cold War were allocated in aid to the other socialist states.From the 1930s until its dissolution in late 1991, the way the Soviet economy operated remained essentially unchanged. The economy was formally directed by central planning, carried out by Gosplan and organized in five-year plans. However, in practice, the plans were highly aggregated and provisional, subject to "ad hoc" intervention by superiors. All critical economic decisions were taken by the political leadership. Allocated resources and plan targets were usually denominated in rubles rather than in physical goods. Credit was discouraged, but widespread. The final allocation of output was achieved through relatively decentralized, unplanned contracting. Although in theory prices were legally set from above, in practice they were often negotiated, and informal horizontal links (e.g. between producer factories) were widespread.A number of basic services were state-funded, such as education and health care. In the manufacturing sector, heavy industry and defence were prioritized over consumer goods. Consumer goods, particularly outside large cities, were often scarce, of poor quality and limited variety. Under the command economy, consumers had almost no influence on production, and the changing demands of a population with growing incomes could not be satisfied by supplies at rigidly fixed prices. A massive unplanned second economy grew up at low levels alongside the planned one, providing some of the goods and services that the planners could not. The legalization of some elements of the decentralized economy was attempted with the reform of 1965.Although statistics of the Soviet economy are notoriously unreliable and its economic growth difficult to estimate precisely, by most accounts, the economy continued to expand until the mid-1980s. During the 1950s and 1960s, it had comparatively high growth and was catching up to the West. However, after 1970, the growth, while still positive, steadily declined much more quickly and consistently than in other countries, despite a rapid increase in the capital stock (the rate of capital increase was only surpassed by Japan).Overall, the growth rate of per capita income in the Soviet Union between 1960 and 1989 was slightly above the world average (based on 102 countries). According to Stanley Fischer and William Easterly, growth could have been faster. By their calculation, per capita income in 1989 should have been twice higher than it was, considering the amount of investment, education and population. The authors attribute this poor performance to the low productivity of capital. Steven Rosenfielde states that the standard of living declined due to Stalin's despotism. While there was a brief improvement after his death, it lapsed into stagnation.In 1987, Mikhail Gorbachev attempted to reform and revitalize the economy with his program of "perestroika". His policies relaxed state control over enterprises but did not replace it by market incentives, resulting in a sharp decline in output. The economy, already suffering from reduced petroleum export revenues, started to collapse. Prices were still fixed, and the property was still largely state-owned until after the country's dissolution. For most of the period after World War II until its collapse, Soviet GDP (PPP) was the second-largest in the world, and third during the second half of the 1980s, although on a per-capita basis, it was behind that of First World countries. Compared to countries with similar per-capita GDP in 1928, the Soviet Union experienced significant growth.In 1990, the country had a Human Development Index of 0.920, placing it in the "high" category of human development. It was the third-highest in the Eastern Bloc, behind Czechoslovakia and East Germany, and the 25th in the world of 130 countries.The need for fuel declined in the Soviet Union from the 1970s to the 1980s, both per ruble of gross social product and per ruble of industrial product. At the start, this decline grew very rapidly but gradually slowed down between 1970 and 1975. From 1975 and 1980, it grew even slower, only 2.6%. David Wilson, a historian, believed that the gas industry would account for 40% of Soviet fuel production by the end of the century. His theory did not come to fruition because of the USSR's collapse. The USSR, in theory, would have continued to have an economic growth rate of 2–2.5% during the 1990s because of Soviet energy fields. However, the energy sector faced many difficulties, among them the country's high military expenditure and hostile relations with the First World.In 1991, the Soviet Union had a pipeline network of for crude oil and another for natural gas. Petroleum and petroleum-based products, natural gas, metals, wood, agricultural products, and a variety of manufactured goods, primarily machinery, arms and military equipment, were exported. In the 1970s and 1980s, the USSR heavily relied on fossil fuel exports to earn hard currency. At its peak in 1988, it was the largest producer and second-largest exporter of crude oil, surpassed only by Saudi Arabia.The Soviet Union placed great emphasis on science and technology within its economy, however, the most remarkable Soviet successes in technology, such as producing the world's first space satellite, typically were the responsibility of the military. Lenin believed that the USSR would never overtake the developed world if it remained as technologically backward as it was upon its founding. Soviet authorities proved their commitment to Lenin's belief by developing massive networks, research and development organizations. In the early 1960s, the Soviets awarded 40% of chemistry PhDs to women, compared to only 5% in the United States. By 1989, Soviet scientists were among the world's best-trained specialists in several areas, such as energy physics, selected areas of medicine, mathematics, welding and military technologies. Due to rigid state planning and bureaucracy, the Soviets remained far behind technologically in chemistry, biology, and computers when compared to the First World.Under the Reagan administration, Project Socrates determined that the Soviet Union addressed the acquisition of science and technology in a manner that was radically different from what the US was using. In the case of the US, economic prioritization was being used for indigenous research and development as the means to acquire science and technology in both the private and public sectors. In contrast, the USSR was offensively and defensively maneuvering in the acquisition and utilization of the worldwide technology, to increase the competitive advantage that they acquired from the technology while preventing the US from acquiring a competitive advantage. However, technology-based planning was executed in a centralized, government-centric manner that greatly hindered its flexibility. This was exploited by the US to undermine the strength of the Soviet Union and thus foster its reform.Transport was a vital component of the country's economy. The economic centralization of the late 1920s and 1930s led to the development of infrastructure on a massive scale, most notably the establishment of Aeroflot, an aviation enterprise. The country had a wide variety of modes of transport by land, water and air. However, due to inadequate maintenance, much of the road, water and Soviet civil aviation transport were outdated and technologically backward compared to the First World.Soviet rail transport was the largest and most intensively used in the world; it was also better developed than most of its Western counterparts. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, Soviet economists were calling for the construction of more roads to alleviate some of the burdens from the railways and to improve the Soviet government budget. The street network and automotive industry remained underdeveloped, and dirt roads were common outside major cities. Soviet maintenance projects proved unable to take care of even the few roads the country had. By the early-to-mid-1980s, the Soviet authorities tried to solve the road problem by ordering the construction of new ones. Meanwhile, the automobile industry was growing at a faster rate than road construction. The underdeveloped road network led to a growing demand for public transport.Despite improvements, several aspects of the transport sector were still riddled with problems due to outdated infrastructure, lack of investment, corruption and bad decision-making. Soviet authorities were unable to meet the growing demand for transport infrastructure and services.The Soviet merchant navy was one of the largest in the world.Excess deaths throughout World War I and the Russian Civil War (including the postwar famine) amounted to a combined total of 18 million, some 10 million in the 1930s, and more than 26 million in 1941–5. The postwar Soviet population was 45 to 50 million smaller than it would have been if pre-war demographic growth had continued. According to Catherine Merridale, "... reasonable estimate would place the total number of excess deaths for the whole period somewhere around 60 million."The birth rate of the USSR decreased from 44.0 per thousand in 1926 to 18.0 in 1974, mainly due to increasing urbanization and the rising average age of marriages. The mortality rate demonstrated a gradual decrease as well – from 23.7 per thousand in 1926 to 8.7 in 1974. In general, the birth rates of the southern republics in Transcaucasia and Central Asia were considerably higher than those in the northern parts of the Soviet Union, and in some cases even increased in the post–World War II period, a phenomenon partly attributed to slower rates of urbanistion and traditionally earlier marriages in the southern republics. Soviet Europe moved towards sub-replacement fertility, while Soviet Central Asia continued to exhibit population growth well above replacement-level fertility.The late 1960s and the 1970s witnessed a reversal of the declining trajectory of the rate of mortality in the USSR, and was especially notable among men of working age, but was also prevalent in Russia and other predominantly Slavic areas of the country. An analysis of the official data from the late 1980s showed that after worsening in the late-1970s and the early 1980s, adult mortality began to improve again. The infant mortality rate increased from 24.7 in 1970 to 27.9 in 1974. Some researchers regarded the rise as mostly real, a consequence of worsening health conditions and services. The rises in both adult and infant mortality were not explained or defended by Soviet officials, and the Soviet government stopped publishing all mortality statistics for ten years. Soviet demographers and health specialists remained silent about the mortality increases until the late-1980s, when the publication of mortality data resumed, and researchers could delve into the real causes.Under Lenin, the state made explicit commitments to promote the equality of men and women. Many early Russian feminists and ordinary Russian working women actively participated in the Revolution, and many more were affected by the events of that period and the new policies. Beginning in October 1918, Lenin's government liberalized divorce and abortion laws, decriminalized homosexuality (re-criminalized in the 1930s), permitted cohabitation, and ushered in a host of reforms. However, without birth control, the new system produced many broken marriages, as well as countless out-of-wedlock children. The epidemic of divorces and extramarital affairs created social hardships when Soviet leaders wanted people to concentrate their efforts on growing the economy. Giving women control over their fertility also led to a precipitous decline in the birth rate, perceived as a threat to their country's military power. By 1936, Stalin reversed most of the liberal laws, ushering in a pronatalist era that lasted for decades.By 1917, Russia became the first great power to grant women the right to vote. After heavy casualties in World War I and II, women outnumbered men in Russia by a 4:3 ratio. This contributed to the larger role women played in Russian society compared to other great powers at the time.Anatoly Lunacharsky became the first People's Commissar for Education of Soviet Russia. In the beginning, the Soviet authorities placed great emphasis on the elimination of illiteracy. All left-handed children were forced to write with their right hand in the Soviet school system. Literate people were automatically hired as teachers. For a short period, quality was sacrificed for quantity. By 1940, Stalin could announce that illiteracy had been eliminated. Throughout the 1930s, social mobility rose sharply, which has been attributed to reforms in education. In the aftermath of World War II, the country's educational system expanded dramatically, which had a tremendous effect. In the 1960s, nearly all children had access to education, the only exception being those living in remote areas. Nikita Khrushchev tried to make education more accessible, making it clear to children that education was closely linked to the needs of society. Education also became important in giving rise to the New Man. Citizens directly entering the workforce had the constitutional right to a job and to free vocational training.The education system was highly centralized and universally accessible to all citizens, with affirmative action for applicants from nations associated with cultural backwardness. However, as part of the general antisemitic policy, an unofficial Jewish quota was applied in the leading institutions of higher education by subjecting Jewish applicants to harsher entrance examinations. The Brezhnev era also introduced a rule that required all university applicants to present a reference from the local Komsomol party secretary. According to statistics from 1986, the number of higher education students per the population of 10,000 was 181 for the USSR, compared to 517 for the US.The Soviet Union was an ethnically diverse country, with more than 100 distinct ethnic groups. The total population of the country was estimated at 293 million in 1991. According to a 1990 estimate, the majority of the population were Russians (50.78%), followed by Ukrainians (15.45%) and Uzbeks (5.84%).All citizens of the USSR had their own ethnic affiliation. The ethnicity of a person was chosen at the age of sixteen by the child's parents. If the parents did not agree, the child was automatically assigned the ethnicity of the father. Partly due to Soviet policies, some of the smaller minority ethnic groups were considered part of larger ones, such as the Mingrelians of Georgia, who were classified with the linguistically related Georgians. Some ethnic groups voluntarily assimilated, while others were brought in by force. Russians, Belarusians, and Ukrainians, who were all East Slavic and Orthodox, shared close cultural, ethnic, and religious ties, while other groups did not. With multiple nationalities living in the same territory, ethnic antagonisms developed over the years.Members of various ethnicities participated in legislative bodies. Organs of power like the Politburo, the Secretariat of the Central Committee etc., were formally ethnically neutral, but in reality, ethnic Russians were overrepresented, although there were also non-Russian leaders in the Soviet leadership, such as Joseph Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev, Nikolai Podgorny or Andrei Gromyko. During the Soviet era, a significant number of ethnic Russians and Ukrainians migrated to other Soviet republics, and many of them settled there. According to the last census in 1989, the Russian "diaspora" in the Soviet republics had reached 25 million.In 1917, before the revolution, health conditions were significantly behind those of developed countries. As Lenin later noted, "Either the lice will defeat socialism, or socialism will defeat the lice". The Soviet principle of health care was conceived by the People's Commissariat for Health in 1918. Health care was to be controlled by the state and would be provided to its citizens free of charge, a revolutionary concept at the time. Article 42 of the 1977 Soviet Constitution gave all citizens the right to health protection and free access to any health institutions in the USSR. Before Leonid Brezhnev became General Secretary, the Soviet healthcare system was held in high esteem by many foreign specialists. This changed, however, from Brezhnev's accession and Mikhail Gorbachev's tenure as leader, during which the health care system was heavily criticized for many basic faults, such as the quality of service and the unevenness in its provision. Minister of Health Yevgeniy Chazov, during the 19th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, while highlighting such successes as having the most doctors and hospitals in the world, recognized the system's areas for improvement and felt that billions of Soviet rubles were squandered. After the revolution, life expectancy for all age groups went up. This statistic in itself was seen by some that the socialist system was superior to the capitalist system. These improvements continued into the 1960s when statistics indicated that the life expectancy briefly surpassed that of the United States. Life expectancy started to decline in the 1970s, possibly because of alcohol abuse. At the same time, infant mortality began to rise. After 1974, the government stopped publishing statistics on the matter. This trend can be partly explained by the number of pregnancies rising drastically in the Asian part of the country where infant mortality was the highest while declining markedly in the more developed European part of the Soviet Union.Soviet dental technology and dental health were considered notoriously bad. In 1991, the average 35-year-old had 12 to 14 cavities, fillings or missing teeth. Toothpaste was often not available, and toothbrushes did not conform to standards of modern dentistry.Under Lenin, the government gave small language groups their own writing systems. The development of these writing systems was highly successful, even though some flaws were detected. During the later days of the USSR, countries with the same multilingual situation implemented similar policies. A serious problem when creating these writing systems was that the languages differed dialectally greatly from each other. When a language had been given a writing system and appeared in a notable publication, it would attain "official language" status. There were many minority languages which never received their own writing system; therefore, their speakers were forced to have a second language. There are examples where the government retreated from this policy, most notably under Stalin where education was discontinued in languages that were not widespread. These languages were then assimilated into another language, mostly Russian. During World War II, some minority languages were banned, and their speakers accused of collaborating with the enemy.As the most widely spoken of the Soviet Union's many languages, Russian "de facto" functioned as an official language, as the "language of interethnic communication" (), but only assumed the "de jure" status as the official national language in 1990.Christianity and Islam had the highest number of adherents among the religious citizens. Eastern Christianity predominated among Christians, with Russia's traditional Russian Orthodox Church being the largest Christian denomination. About 90% of the Soviet Union's Muslims were Sunnis, with Shias being concentrated in the Azerbaijan SSR. Smaller groups included Roman Catholics, Jews, Buddhists, and a variety of Protestant denominations (especially Baptists and Lutherans).Religious influence had been strong in the Russian Empire. The Russian Orthodox Church enjoyed a privileged status as the church of the monarchy and took part in carrying out official state functions. The immediate period following the establishment of the Soviet state included a struggle against the Orthodox Church, which the revolutionaries considered an ally of the former ruling classes.In Soviet law, the "freedom to hold religious services" was constitutionally guaranteed, although the ruling Communist Party regarded religion as incompatible with the Marxist spirit of scientific materialism. In practice, the Soviet system subscribed to a narrow interpretation of this right, and in fact utilized a range of official measures to discourage religion and curb the activities of religious groups.The 1918 Council of People's Commissars decree establishing the Russian SFSR as a secular state also decreed that "the teaching of religion in all [places] where subjects of general instruction are taught, is forbidden. Citizens may teach and may be taught religion privately." Among further restrictions, those adopted in 1929 included express prohibitions on a range of church activities, including meetings for organized Bible study. Both Christian and non-Christian establishments were shut down by the thousands in the 1920s and 1930s. By 1940, as many as 90% of the churches, synagogues, and mosques that had been operating in 1917 were closed.Under the doctrine of state atheism, a "government-sponsored program of forced conversion to atheism" was conducted. The government targeted religions based on state interests, and while most organized religions were never outlawed, religious property was confiscated, believers were harassed, and religion was ridiculed while atheism was propagated in schools. In 1925, the government founded the League of Militant Atheists to intensify the propaganda campaign. Accordingly, although personal expressions of religious faith were not explicitly banned, a strong sense of social stigma was imposed on them by the formal structures and mass media, and it was generally considered unacceptable for members of certain professions (teachers, state bureaucrats, soldiers) to be openly religious. While persecution accelerated following Stalin's rise to power, a revival of Orthodoxy was fostered by the government during World War II and the Soviet authorities sought to control the Russian Orthodox Church rather than liquidate it. During the first five years of Soviet power, the Bolsheviks executed 28 Russian Orthodox bishops and over 1,200 Russian Orthodox priests. Many others were imprisoned or exiled. Believers were harassed and persecuted. Most seminaries were closed, and the publication of most religious material was prohibited. By 1941, only 500 churches remained open out of about 54,000 in existence before World War I.Convinced that religious anti-Sovietism had become a thing of the past, and with the looming threat of war, the Stalin regime began shifting to a more moderate religion policy in the late 1930s. Soviet religious establishments overwhelmingly rallied to support the war effort during World War II. Amid other accommodations to religious faith after the German invasion, churches were reopened. Radio Moscow began broadcasting a religious hour, and a historic meeting between Stalin and Orthodox Church leader Patriarch Sergius of Moscow was held in 1943. Stalin had the support of the majority of the religious people in the USSR even through the late 1980s. The general tendency of this period was an increase in religious activity among believers of all faiths.Under Nikita Khrushchev, the state leadership clashed with the churches in 1958–1964, a period when atheism was emphasized in the educational curriculum, and numerous state publications promoted atheistic views. During this period, the number of churches fell from 20,000 to 10,000 from 1959 to 1965, and the number of synagogues dropped from 500 to 97. The number of working mosques also declined, falling from 1,500 to 500 within a decade.Religious institutions remained monitored by the Soviet government, but churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques were all given more leeway in the Brezhnev era. Official relations between the Orthodox Church and the government again warmed to the point that the Brezhnev government twice honored Orthodox Patriarch Alexy I with the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. A poll conducted by Soviet authorities in 1982 recorded 20% of the Soviet population as "active religious believers."The legacy of the USSR remains a controversial topic. The socio-economic nature of communist states such as the USSR, especially under Stalin, has also been much debated, varyingly being labelled a form of bureaucratic collectivism, state capitalism, state socialism, or a totally unique mode of production.The USSR implemented a broad range of policies over a long period of time, with a large amount of conflicting policies being implemented by different leaders. Some have a positive view of it whilst others are critical towards the country, calling it a repressive oligarchy. The opinions on the USSR are complex and have changed over time, with different generations having different views on the matter as well as on Soviet policies corresponding to separate time periods during its history. Leftists have largely varying views on the USSR. Whilst some leftists such as anarchists and other libertarian socialists, agree it did not give the workers control over the means of production and was a centralized oligarchy, others have more positive opinions as to the Bolshevik policies and Vladimir Lenin. Many anti-Stalinist leftists such as anarchists are extremely critical of Soviet authoritarianism and repression. Much of the criticism it receives is centered around massacres in the Soviet Union, the centralized hierarchy present in the USSR and mass political repression as well as violence towards government critics and political dissidents such as other leftists. Critics also point towards its failure to implement any substantial worker cooperatives or implementing worker liberation as well as corruption and the Soviet authoritarian nature.Many Russians and other former Soviet citizens have nostalgia for the USSR, pointing towards most infrastructure being built during Soviet times, increased job security, increased literacy rate, increased caloric intake and supposed ethnic pluralism enacted in the Soviet Union as well as political stability. The Russian Revolution is also seen in a positive light as well as the leadership of Lenin, Nikita Khrushchev and the later USSR, although many view Joseph Stalin's rule as positive for the country. In Armenia, 12% of respondents said the USSR collapse did good, while 66% said it did harm. In Kyrgyzstan, 16% of respondents said the collapse of the USSR did good, while 61% said it did harm. In a 2018 Rating Sociological Group poll, 47% of Ukrainian respondents had a positive opinion of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, who ruled the Soviet Union from 1964 to 1982. Much of the admiration of the USSR comes from the failings of the modern post-Soviet governments such as the control by oligarchs, corruption and outdated Soviet-era infrastructure as well as the rise and dominance of organised crime after the collapse of the USSR all directly leading into nostalgia for it.The 1941–45 period of World War II is still known in Russia as the "Great Patriotic War". The war became a topic of great importance in cinema, literature, history lessons at school, the mass media, and the arts. As a result of the massive losses suffered by the military and civilians during the conflict, Victory Day celebrated on 9 May is still one of the most important and emotional dates in Russia.In some post Soviet republics, there is a more negative view of the USSR, although there is no unanimity on the matter. In large part due to the Holodomor, ethnic Ukrainians have a negative view of it. Russian-speaking Ukrainians of Ukraine's southern and eastern regions have a more positive view of the USSR. In some countries with internal conflict, there is also nostalgia for the USSR, especially for refugees of the post-Soviet conflicts who have been forced to flee their homes and have been displaced. This nostalgia is less an admiration for the country or its policies than it is a longing to return to their homes and not to live in poverty. The many Russian enclaves in the former USSR republics such as Transnistria have in a general a positive remembrance of it.The left's view of the USSR is complex. While some leftists regard the USSR as an example of state capitalism or that it was an oligarchical state, other leftists admire Vladimir Lenin and the Russian Revolution.Council communists generally view the USSR as failing to create class consciousness, turning into a corrupt state in which the elite controlled society. Anarchists are critical of the country, labeling the Soviet system as "red fascism". Soviets actively destroyed anarchist organizations and anarchist communities, labeling anarchists as "enemies of the people". Factors contributing to the animosity towards the USSR included: the Soviet invasion of the anarchist Free Territory, the suppression of the anarchist Kronstadt rebellion and the response to the Norilsk uprising, in which prisoners created a radical system of government based on cooperatives and direct democracy in the Gulag. Anarchist organizations and unions were also banned during the Spanish Civil War under the Republican government by orders from the Soviet government. Due to this, anarchists generally hold a large animosity towards the USSR.The culture of the Soviet Union passed through several stages during the USSR's existence. During the first decade following the revolution, there was relative freedom and artists experimented with several different styles to find a distinctive Soviet style of art. Lenin wanted art to be accessible to the Russian people. On the other hand, hundreds of intellectuals, writers, and artists were exiled or executed, and their work banned, such as Nikolay Gumilyov who was shot for alleged conspiring against the Bolshevik regime, and Yevgeny Zamyatin.The government encouraged a variety of trends. In art and literature, numerous schools, some traditional and others radically experimental, proliferated. Communist writers Maxim Gorky and Vladimir Mayakovsky were active during this time. As a means of influencing a largely illiterate society, films received encouragement from the state, and much of director Sergei Eisenstein's best work dates from this period.During Stalin's rule, the Soviet culture was characterized by the rise and domination of the government-imposed style of socialist realism, with all other trends being severely repressed, with rare exceptions, such as Mikhail Bulgakov's works. Many writers were imprisoned and killed.Following the Khrushchev Thaw, censorship was diminished. During this time, a distinctive period of Soviet culture developed, characterized by conformist public life and an intense focus on personal life. Greater experimentation in art forms was again permissible, resulting in the production of more sophisticated and subtly critical work. The regime loosened its emphasis on socialist realism; thus, for instance, many protagonists of the novels of author Yury Trifonov concerned themselves with problems of daily life rather than with building socialism. Underground dissident literature, known as "samizdat", developed during this late period. In architecture, the Khrushchev era mostly focused on functional design as opposed to the highly decorated style of Stalin's epoch. In music, in response to the increasing popularity of forms of popular music like jazz in the West, many jazz orchestras were permitted throughout the USSR, notably the Melodiya Ensemble, named after the principle record label in the USSR.In the second half of the 1980s, Gorbachev's policies of "perestroika" and "glasnost" significantly expanded freedom of expression throughout the country in the media and the press.Founded on 20 July 1924 in Moscow, "Sovetsky Sport" was the first sports newspaper of the Soviet Union.The Soviet Olympic Committee formed on 21 April 1951, and the IOC recognized the new body in its 45th session. In the same year, when the Soviet representative Konstantin Andrianov became an IOC member, the USSR officially joined the Olympic Movement. The 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki thus became first Olympic Games for Soviet athletes. The Soviet Union was the biggest rival to the United States at the Summer Olympics, winning six of its nine appearances at the games and also topping the medal tally at the Winter Olympics six times. The Soviet Union's Olympics success has been attributed to its large investment in sports to demonstrate its superpower image and political influence on a global stage.The Soviet Union national ice hockey team won nearly every world championship and Olympic tournament between 1954 and 1991 and never failed to medal in any International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) tournament in which they competed.The advent of the state-sponsored "full-time amateur athlete" of the Eastern Bloc countries further eroded the ideology of the pure amateur, as it put the self-financed amateurs of the Western countries at a disadvantage. The Soviet Union entered teams of athletes who were all nominally students, soldiers, or working in a profession – in reality, the state paid many of these competitors to train on a full-time basis. Nevertheless, the IOC held to the traditional rules regarding amateurism.A 1989 report by a committee of the Australian Senate claimed that "there is hardly a medal winner at the Moscow Games, certainly not a gold medal winner...who is not on one sort of drug or another: usually several kinds. The Moscow Games might well have been called the Chemists' Games".A member of the IOC Medical Commission, Manfred Donike, privately ran additional tests with a new technique for identifying abnormal levels of testosterone by measuring its ratio to epitestosterone in urine. Twenty percent of the specimens he tested, including those from sixteen gold medalists, would have resulted in disciplinary proceedings had the tests been official. The results of Donike's unofficial tests later convinced the IOC to add his new technique to their testing protocols. The first documented case of "blood doping" occurred at the 1980 Summer Olympics when a runner was transfused with two pints of blood before winning medals in the 5000 m and 10,000 m.Documentation obtained in 2016 revealed the Soviet Union's plans for a statewide doping system in track and field in preparation for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Dated before the decision to boycott the 1984 Games, the document detailed the existing steroids operations of the program, along with suggestions for further enhancements. Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture prepared the communication, directed to the Soviet Union's head of track and field. Portugalov later became one of the leading figures involved in the implementation of Russian doping before the 2016 Summer Olympics.Official Soviet environmental policy has always attached great importance to actions in which human beings actively improve nature. Lenin's quote "Communism is Soviet power and electrification of the country!" in many respects summarizes the focus on modernization and industrial development. During the first five-year plan in 1928, Stalin proceeded to industrialize the country at all costs. Values such as environmental and nature protection have been completely ignored in the struggle to create a modern industrial society. After Stalin's death, they focused more on environmental issues, but the basic perception of the value of environmental protection remained the same.The Soviet media has always focused on the vast expanse of land and the virtually indestructible natural resources. This made it feel that contamination and uncontrolled exploitation of nature were not a problem. The Soviet state also firmly believed that scientific and technological progress would solve all the problems. Official ideology said that under socialism environmental problems could easily be overcome, unlike capitalist countries, where they seemingly could not be solved. The Soviet authorities had an almost unwavering belief that man could transcend nature. However, when the authorities had to admit that there were environmental problems in the USSR in the 1980s, they explained the problems in such a way that socialism had not yet been fully developed; pollution in a socialist society was only a temporary anomaly that would have been resolved if socialism had developed.The Chernobyl disaster in 1986 was the first major accident at a civilian nuclear power plant. Unparalleled in the world, it resulted in a large number of radioactive isotopes being released into the atmosphere. Radioactive doses have scattered relatively far. 4,000 new cases of thyroid cancer were reported after the incident, but this led to a relatively low number of deaths (WHO data, 2005). However, the long-term effects of the accident are unknown. Another major accident is the Kyshtym disaster.After the fall of the USSR, it was discovered that the environmental problems were greater than what the Soviet authorities admitted. The Kola Peninsula was one of the places with clear problems. Around the industrial cities of Monchegorsk and Norilsk, where nickel, for example, is mined, all forests have been destroyed by contamination, while the northern and other parts of Russia have been affected by emissions. During the 1990s, people in the West were also interested in the radioactive hazards of nuclear facilities, decommissioned nuclear submarines, and the processing of nuclear waste or spent nuclear fuel. It was also known in the early 1990s that the USSR had transported radioactive material to the Barents Sea and Kara Sea, which was later confirmed by the Russian parliament. The crash of the K-141 Kursk submarine in 2000 in the west further raised concerns. In the past, there were accidents involving submarines K-19, K-8, and K-129.
|
[
"Georgy Malenkov",
"Alexei Kosygin",
"Nikolai Ryzhkov",
"Joseph Stalin",
"Alexei Rykov",
"Ivan Silayev",
"Vladimir Lenin",
"Nikolai Bulganin",
"Nikolai Tikhonov",
"Vyacheslav Molotov",
"Valentin Pavlov"
] |
|
Who was the head of Soviet Union in 1959-03-18?
|
March 18, 1959
|
{
"text": [
"Nikita Khrushchev"
]
}
|
L2_Q15180_P6_6
|
Nikolai Bulganin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1955 to Mar, 1958.
Nikolai Tikhonov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1980 to Sep, 1985.
Ivan Silayev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1991 to Dec, 1991.
Alexei Kosygin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1964 to Oct, 1980.
Valentin Pavlov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jan, 1991 to Aug, 1991.
Nikolai Ryzhkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1985 to Jan, 1991.
Georgy Malenkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1953 to Feb, 1955.
Alexei Rykov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1924 to Dec, 1930.
Vyacheslav Molotov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Dec, 1930 to May, 1941.
Joseph Stalin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from May, 1941 to Mar, 1953.
Nikita Khrushchev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1958 to Oct, 1964.
Vladimir Lenin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jul, 1923 to Jan, 1924.
|
Soviet UnionThe Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a socialist state that spanned most of Europe and Asia during its existence from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a federal union of multiple national republics; in practice its government and economy were highly centralized until its final years. The country was a one-party state prior to 1990 governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with Moscow as its capital within its largest and most populous republic, the Russian SFSR. Other major urban centers were Leningrad (Russian SFSR), Kiev (Ukrainian SSR), Minsk (Byelorussian SSR), Tashkent (Uzbek SSR), Alma-Ata (Kazakh SSR) and Novosibirsk (Russian SFSR). It was the largest country in the world, covering over , and spanning eleven time zones. The Soviet Union's five biomes were tundra, taiga, steppes, desert, and mountains. Its diverse population was officially known as the Soviet people.The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 when the Bolsheviks, headed by Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Provisional Government that had earlier replaced the monarchy of the Russian Empire. They established the Russian Soviet Republic, beginning a civil war between the Bolshevik Red Army and many anti-Bolshevik forces across the former Empire, among whom the largest faction was the White Guard, which engaged in violent anti-communist repression against the Bolsheviks and their worker and peasant supporters known as the White Terror. The Red Army expanded and helped local Bolsheviks take power, establishing soviets, repressing their political opponents and rebellious peasants through Red Terror. By 1922, the Bolsheviks had emerged victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian republics. The New Economic Policy (NEP), which was introduced by Lenin, led to a partial return of a free market and private property; this resulted in a period of economic recovery.Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power. Stalin suppressed all political opposition to his rule inside the Communist Party and inaugurated a command economy. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and forced collectivization, which led to significant economic growth, but also led to a man-made famine in 1932–1933 and expanded the Gulag labour camp system originally established in 1918. Stalin also fomented political paranoia and conducted the Great Purge to remove his actual and perceived opponents from the Party through mass arrests of military leaders, Communist Party members, and ordinary citizens alike, who were then sent to correctional labor camps or sentenced to death.On 23 August 1939, after unsuccessful efforts to form an anti-fascist alliance with Western powers, the Soviets signed the non-aggression agreement with Nazi Germany. After the start of World War II, the formally neutral Soviets invaded and annexed territories of several Eastern European states, including eastern Poland and the Baltic states. In June 1941 the Germans invaded, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the cost of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at intense battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin and won World War II in Europe on 9 May 1945. The territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged in 1947 as a result of a post-war Soviet dominance in Eastern Europe, where the Eastern Bloc confronted the Western Bloc that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949.Following Stalin's death in 1953, a period known as de-Stalinization and the Khrushchev Thaw occurred under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev. The country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took an early lead in the Space Race with the first ever satellite and the first human spaceflight and the first probe to land on another planet, Venus. In the 1970s, there was a brief "détente" of relations with the United States, but tensions resumed when the Soviet Union deployed troops in Afghanistan in 1979. The war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters.In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to further reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of "glasnost" and "perestroika". The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing economic stagnation. The Cold War ended during his tenure and in 1989, Warsaw Pact countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective Marxist-Leninist regimes. Strong nationalist and separatist movements broke out across the USSR. Gorbachev initiated a referendum—boycotted by the Baltic republics, Armenia, Georgia, and Moldova—which resulted in the majority of participating citizens voting in favor of preserving the Union as a renewed federation. In August 1991, a coup d'état was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a high-profile role in facing down the coup. The main result was the banning of the Communist Party. The republics led by Russia and Ukraine declared independence. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned. All the republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states. The Russian Federation (formerly the Russian SFSR) assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations and is recognized as its continued legal personality in world affairs.The USSR produced many significant social and technological achievements and innovations regarding military power. It boasted the world's second-largest economy and the largest standing military in the world. The USSR was recognized as one of the five nuclear weapons states. It was a founding permanent member of the United Nations Security Council as well as a member of the OSCE, the WFTU and the leading member of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the Warsaw Pact.Before its dissolution, the USSR had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II. Sometimes also called "Soviet Empire", it exercised its hegemony in Eastern Europe and worldwide with military and economic strength, proxy conflicts and influence in developing countries and funding of scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The word "soviet" is derived from the Russian word "sovet" (), meaning "council", "assembly", "advice", ultimately deriving from the proto-Slavic verbal stem of "vět-iti" ("to inform"), related to Slavic "věst" ("news"), English "wise", the root in "ad-vis-or" (which came to English through French), or the Dutch "weten" ("to know"; cf. "wetenschap" meaning "science"). The word "sovietnik" means "councillor".Some organizations in Russian history were called "council" (). In the Russian Empire, the State Council which functioned from 1810 to 1917 was referred to as a Council of Ministers after the revolt of 1905.During the Georgian Affair, Vladimir Lenin envisioned an expression of Great Russian ethnic chauvinism by Joseph Stalin and his supporters, calling for these nation-states to join Russia as semi-independent parts of a greater union which he initially named as the Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia (). Stalin initially resisted the proposal but ultimately accepted it, although with Lenin's agreement changed the name to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), albeit all the republics began as "socialist soviet" and did not change to the other order until 1936. In addition, in the national languages of several republics, the word "council" or "conciliar" in the respective language was only quite late changed to an adaptation of the Russian "soviet" and never in others, e.g. Ukraine."СССР" (in Latin alphabet: "SSSR") is the abbreviation of USSR in Russian. It is written in Cyrillic letters. The Soviets used the Cyrillic abbreviation so frequently that audiences worldwide became familiar with its meaning. Notably, both Cyrillic letters used have homoglyphic (but transliterally distinct) letters in Latin alphabets. Because of widespread familiarity with the Cyrillic abbreviation, Latin alphabet users in particular almost always use the Latin homoglyphs "C" and "P" (as opposed to the transliteral Latin letters "S" and "R") when rendering the USSR's native abbreviation.After "СССР", the most common short form names for the Soviet state in Russian were "Советский Союз" (transliteration: "Sovetskiy Soyuz") which literally means "Soviet Union", and also "Союз ССР" (transliteration: "Soyuz SSR") which, after compensating for grammatical differences, essentially translates to "Union of SSR's" in English.In the English language media, the state was referred to as the Soviet Union or the USSR. In other European languages, the locally translated short forms and abbreviations are usually used such as "Union soviétique" and "URSS" in French, or "Sowjetunion" and "UdSSR" in German. In the English-speaking world, the Soviet Union was also informally called Russia and its citizens Russians, although that was technically incorrect since Russia was only one of the republics. Such misapplications of the linguistic equivalents to the term "Russia" and its derivatives were frequent in other languages as well.The Soviet Union covered an area of over , and was the world's largest country, a status that is retained by its successor state, Russia. It covered a sixth of Earth's land surface, and its size was comparable to the continent of North America. Its western part in Europe accounted for a quarter of the country's area and was the cultural and economic center. The eastern part in Asia extended to the Pacific Ocean to the east and Afghanistan to the south, and, except some areas in Central Asia, was much less populous. It spanned over east to west across eleven time zones, and over north to south. It had five climate zones: tundra, taiga, steppes, desert and mountains.The Soviet Union, similarly to Russia, had the world's longest border, measuring over , or circumferences of Earth. Two-thirds of it was a coastline. The country bordered Afghanistan, China, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Hungary, Iran, Mongolia, North Korea, Norway, Poland, Romania, and Turkey from 1945 to 1991. The Bering Strait separated the country from the United States, while the La Pérouse Strait separated it from Japan.The Soviet Union's highest mountain was Communism Peak (now Ismoil Somoni Peak) in Tajik SSR, at . It also included most of the world's largest lakes; the Caspian Sea (shared with Iran), and Lake Baikal in Russia, the world's largest and deepest freshwater lake.Modern revolutionary activity in the Russian Empire began with the 1825 Decembrist revolt. Although serfdom was abolished in 1861, it was done on terms unfavorable to the peasants and served to encourage revolutionaries. A parliament—the State Duma—was established in 1906 after the Russian Revolution of 1905, but Tsar Nicholas II resisted attempts to move from absolute to a constitutional monarchy. Social unrest continued and was aggravated during World War I by military defeat and food shortages in major cities.A spontaneous popular uprising in Petrograd, in response to the wartime decay of Russia's economy and morale, culminated in the February Revolution and the toppling of Nicholas II and the imperial government in March 1917. The tsarist autocracy was replaced by the Russian Provisional Government, which intended to conduct elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly and to continue fighting on the side of the Entente in World War I.At the same time, workers' councils, known in Russian as "Soviets", sprang up across the country. The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, pushed for socialist revolution in the Soviets and on the streets. On 7 November 1917, the Red Guards stormed the Winter Palace in Petrograd, ending the rule of the Provisional Government and leaving all political power to the Soviets. This event would later be officially known in Soviet bibliographies as the Great October Socialist Revolution. In December, the Bolsheviks signed an armistice with the Central Powers, though by February 1918, fighting had resumed. In March, the Soviets ended involvement in the war and signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.A long and bloody Civil War ensued between the Reds and the Whites, starting in 1917 and ending in 1923 with the Reds' victory. It included foreign intervention, the execution of the former tsar and his family, and the famine of 1921, which killed about five million people. In March 1921, during a related conflict with Poland, the Peace of Riga was signed, splitting disputed territories in Belarus and Ukraine between the Republic of Poland and Soviet Russia. Soviet Russia had to resolve similar conflicts with the newly established republics of Estonia, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania.On 28 December 1922, a conference of plenipotentiary delegations from the Russian SFSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR approved the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and the Declaration of the Creation of the USSR, forming the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. These two documents were confirmed by the first Congress of Soviets of the USSR and signed by the heads of the delegations, Mikhail Kalinin, Mikhail Tskhakaya, Mikhail Frunze, Grigory Petrovsky, and Alexander Chervyakov, on 30 December 1922. The formal proclamation was made from the stage of the Bolshoi Theatre.An intensive restructuring of the economy, industry and politics of the country began in the early days of Soviet power in 1917. A large part of this was done according to the Bolshevik Initial Decrees, government documents signed by Vladimir Lenin. One of the most prominent breakthroughs was the GOELRO plan, which envisioned a major restructuring of the Soviet economy based on total electrification of the country. The plan became the prototype for subsequent Five-Year Plans and was fulfilled by 1931. After the economic policy of "War communism" during the Russian Civil War, as a prelude to fully developing socialism in the country, the Soviet government permitted some private enterprise to coexist alongside nationalized industry in the 1920s, and total food requisition in the countryside was replaced by a food tax.From its creation, the government in the Soviet Union was based on the one-party rule of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks). The stated purpose was to prevent the return of capitalist exploitation, and that the principles of democratic centralism would be the most effective in representing the people's will in a practical manner. The debate over the future of the economy provided the background for a power struggle in the years after Lenin's death in 1924. Initially, Lenin was to be replaced by a "troika" consisting of Grigory Zinoviev of the Ukrainian SSR, Lev Kamenev of the Russian SFSR, and Joseph Stalin of the Transcaucasian SFSR.On 1 February 1924, the USSR was recognized by the United Kingdom. The same year, a Soviet Constitution was approved, legitimizing the December 1922 union. According to Archie Brown the constitution was never an accurate guide to political reality in the USSR. For example the fact that the Party played the leading role in making and enforcing policy was not mentioned in it until 1977. The USSR was a federative entity of many constituent republics, each with its own political and administrative entities. However, the term "Soviet Russia"strictly applicable only to the Russian Federative Socialist Republicwas often applied to the entire country by non-Soviet writers.On 3 April 1922, Stalin was named the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Lenin had appointed Stalin the head of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate, which gave Stalin considerable power. By gradually consolidating his influence and isolating and outmanoeuvring his rivals within the party, Stalin became the undisputed leader of the country and, by the end of the 1920s, established a totalitarian rule. In October 1927, Zinoviev and Leon Trotsky were expelled from the Central Committee and forced into exile.In 1928, Stalin introduced the first five-year plan for building a socialist economy. In place of the internationalism expressed by Lenin throughout the Revolution, it aimed to build Socialism in One Country. In industry, the state assumed control over all existing enterprises and undertook an intensive program of industrialization. In agriculture, rather than adhering to the "lead by example" policy advocated by Lenin, forced collectivization of farms was implemented all over the country.Famines ensued as a result, causing deaths estimated at three to seven million; surviving kulaks were persecuted, and many were sent to Gulags to do forced labor. Social upheaval continued in the mid-1930s. Despite the turmoil of the mid-to-late 1930s, the country developed a robust industrial economy in the years preceding World War II.Closer cooperation between the USSR and the West developed in the early 1930s. From 1932 to 1934, the country participated in the World Disarmament Conference. In 1933, diplomatic relations between the United States and the USSR were established when in November, the newly elected President of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, chose to recognize Stalin's Communist government formally and negotiated a new trade agreement between the two countries. In September 1934, the country joined the League of Nations. After the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, the USSR actively supported the Republican forces against the Nationalists, who were supported by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany.In December 1936, Stalin unveiled a new constitution that was praised by supporters around the world as the most democratic constitution imaginable, though there was some skepticism. Stalin's Great Purge resulted in the detainment or execution of many "Old Bolsheviks" who had participated in the October Revolution with Lenin. According to declassified Soviet archives, the NKVD arrested more than one and a half million people in 1937 and 1938, of whom 681,692 were shot. Over those two years, there were an average of over one thousand executions a day.In 1939, after attempts to form a military alliance with Britain and France against Germany failed, the Soviet Union made a dramatic shift towards Nazi Germany. Almost a year after Britain and France had concluded the Munich Agreement with Germany, the Soviet Union made agreements with Germany as well, both militarily and economically during extensive talks. The two countries concluded the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and the German–Soviet Commercial Agreement in August 1939. The former made possible the Soviet occupation of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bessarabia, northern Bukovina, and eastern Poland, while the Soviets remained formally neutral. In late November, unable to coerce the Republic of Finland by diplomatic means into moving its border back from Leningrad, Stalin ordered the invasion of Finland. In the east, the Soviet military won several decisive victories during border clashes with the Empire of Japan in 1938 and 1939. However, in April 1941, the USSR signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact with Japan, recognizing the territorial integrity of Manchukuo, a Japanese puppet state.Germany broke the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 starting what was known in the USSR as the Great Patriotic War. The Red Army stopped the seemingly invincible German Army at the Battle of Moscow. The Battle of Stalingrad, which lasted from late 1942 to early 1943, dealt a severe blow to Germany from which they never fully recovered and became a turning point in the war. After Stalingrad, Soviet forces drove through Eastern Europe to Berlin before Germany surrendered in 1945. The German Army suffered 80% of its military deaths in the Eastern Front. Harry Hopkins, a close foreign policy advisor to Franklin D. Roosevelt, spoke on 10 August 1943 of the USSR's decisive role in the war.In the same year, the USSR, in fulfilment of its agreement with the Allies at the Yalta Conference, denounced the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1945 and invaded Manchukuo and other Japan-controlled territories on 9 August 1945. This conflict ended with a decisive Soviet victory, contributing to the unconditional surrender of Japan and the end of World War II.The USSR suffered greatly in the war, losing around 27 million people. Approximately 2.8 million Soviet POWs died of starvation, mistreatment, or executions in just eight months of 1941–42. During the war, the country together with the United States, the United Kingdom and China were considered the Big Four Allied powers, and later became the Four Policemen that formed the basis of the United Nations Security Council. It emerged as a superpower in the post-war period. Once denied diplomatic recognition by the Western world, the USSR had official relations with practically every country by the late 1940s. A member of the United Nations at its foundation in 1945, the country became one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, which gave it the right to veto any of its resolutions.During the immediate post-war period, the Soviet Union rebuilt and expanded its economy, while maintaining its strictly centralized control. It took effective control over most of the countries of Eastern Europe (except Yugoslavia and later Albania), turning them into satellite states. The USSR bound its satellite states in a military alliance, the Warsaw Pact, in 1955, and an economic organization, Council for Mutual Economic Assistance or Comecon, a counterpart to the European Economic Community (EEC), from 1949 to 1991. The USSR concentrated on its own recovery, seizing and transferring most of Germany's industrial plants, and it exacted war reparations from East Germany, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria using Soviet-dominated joint enterprises. It also instituted trading arrangements deliberately designed to favor the country. Moscow controlled the Communist parties that ruled the satellite states, and they followed orders from the Kremlin. Later, the Comecon supplied aid to the eventually victorious Communist Party of China, and its influence grew elsewhere in the world. Fearing its ambitions, the Soviet Union's wartime allies, the United Kingdom and the United States, became its enemies. In the ensuing Cold War, the two sides clashed indirectly in proxy wars.Stalin died on 5 March 1953. Without a mutually agreeable successor, the highest Communist Party officials initially opted to rule the Soviet Union jointly through a troika headed by Georgy Malenkov. This did not last, however, and Nikita Khrushchev eventually won the ensuing power struggle by the mid-1950s. In 1956, he denounced Joseph Stalin and proceeded to ease controls over the party and society. This was known as de-Stalinization.Moscow considered Eastern Europe to be a critically vital buffer zone for the forward defence of its western borders, in case of another major invasion such as the German invasion of 1941. For this reason, the USSR sought to cement its control of the region by transforming the Eastern European countries into satellite states, dependent upon and subservient to its leadership. As a result, Soviet military forces were used to suppress an anti-communist uprising in Hungary in 1956.In the late 1950s, a confrontation with China regarding the Soviet rapprochement with the West, and what Mao Zedong perceived as Khrushchev's revisionism, led to the Sino–Soviet split. This resulted in a break throughout the global Marxist–Leninist movement, with the governments in Albania, Cambodia and Somalia choosing to ally with China.During this period of the late 1950s and early 1960s, the USSR continued to realize scientific and technological exploits in the Space Race, rivaling the United States: launching the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1 in 1957; a living dog named Laika in 1957; the first human being, Yuri Gagarin in 1961; the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova in 1963; Alexei Leonov, the first person to walk in space in 1965; the first soft landing on the Moon by spacecraft Luna 9 in 1966; and the first Moon rovers, Lunokhod 1 and Lunokhod 2.Khrushchev initiated "The Thaw", a complex shift in political, cultural and economic life in the country. This included some openness and contact with other nations and new social and economic policies with more emphasis on commodity goods, allowing a dramatic rise in living standards while maintaining high levels of economic growth. Censorship was relaxed as well. Khrushchev's reforms in agriculture and administration, however, were generally unproductive. In 1962, he precipitated a crisis with the United States over the Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles in Cuba. An agreement was made with the United States to remove nuclear missiles from both Cuba and Turkey, concluding the crisis. This event caused Khrushchev much embarrassment and loss of prestige, resulting in his removal from power in 1964.Following the ousting of Khrushchev, another period of collective leadership ensued, consisting of Leonid Brezhnev as General Secretary, Alexei Kosygin as Premier and Nikolai Podgorny as Chairman of the Presidium, lasting until Brezhnev established himself in the early 1970s as the preeminent Soviet leader.In 1968, the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact allies invaded Czechoslovakia to halt the Prague Spring reforms. In the aftermath, Brezhnev justified the invasion and previous military interventions as well as any potential military interventions in the future by introducing the Brezhnev Doctrine, which proclaimed any threat to socialist rule in a Warsaw Pact state as a threat to all Warsaw Pact states, therefore justifying military intervention.Brezhnev presided throughout "détente" with the West that resulted in treaties on armament control (SALT I, SALT II, Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty) while at the same time building up Soviet military might.In October 1977, the third Soviet Constitution was unanimously adopted. The prevailing mood of the Soviet leadership at the time of Brezhnev's death in 1982 was one of aversion to change. The long period of Brezhnev's rule had come to be dubbed one of "standstill", with an ageing and ossified top political leadership. This period is also known as the Era of Stagnation, a period of adverse economic, political, and social effects in the country, which began during the rule of Brezhnev and continued under his successors Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko.In late 1979, the Soviet Union's military intervened in the ongoing civil war in neighboring Afghanistan, effectively ending a détente with the West.Two developments dominated the decade that followed: the increasingly apparent crumbling of the Soviet Union's economic and political structures, and the patchwork attempts at reforms to reverse that process. Kenneth S. Deffeyes argued in "Beyond Oil" that the Reagan administration encouraged Saudi Arabia to lower the price of oil to the point where the Soviets could not make a profit selling their oil, and resulted in the depletion of the country's hard currency reserves.Brezhnev's next two successors, transitional figures with deep roots in his tradition, did not last long. Yuri Andropov was 68 years old and Konstantin Chernenko 72 when they assumed power; both died in less than two years. In an attempt to avoid a third short-lived leader, in 1985, the Soviets turned to the next generation and selected Mikhail Gorbachev. He made significant changes in the economy and party leadership, called "perestroika". His policy of "glasnost" freed public access to information after decades of heavy government censorship. Gorbachev also moved to end the Cold War. In 1988, the USSR abandoned its war in Afghanistan and began to withdraw its forces. In the following year, Gorbachev refused to interfere in the internal affairs of the Soviet satellite states, which paved the way for the Revolutions of 1989. In particular, the standstill of the Soviet Union at the Pan-European Picnic in August 1989 then set a peaceful chain reaction in motion at the end of which the Eastern Bloc collapsed. With the tearing down of the Berlin Wall and with East and West Germany pursuing unification, the Iron Curtain between the West and Soviet-controlled regions came down.At the same time, the Soviet republics started legal moves towards potentially declaring sovereignty over their territories, citing the freedom to secede in Article 72 of the USSR constitution. On 7 April 1990, a law was passed allowing a republic to secede if more than two-thirds of its residents voted for it in a referendum. Many held their first free elections in the Soviet era for their own national legislatures in 1990. Many of these legislatures proceeded to produce legislation contradicting the Union laws in what was known as the "War of Laws". In 1989, the Russian SFSR convened a newly elected Congress of People's Deputies. Boris Yeltsin was elected its chairman. On 12 June 1990, the Congress declared Russia's sovereignty over its territory and proceeded to pass laws that attempted to supersede some of the Soviet laws. After a landslide victory of Sąjūdis in Lithuania, that country declared its independence restored on 11 March 1990.A referendum for the preservation of the USSR was held on 17 March 1991 in nine republics (the remainder having boycotted the vote), with the majority of the population in those republics voting for preservation of the Union. The referendum gave Gorbachev a minor boost. In the summer of 1991, the New Union Treaty, which would have turned the country into a much looser Union, was agreed upon by eight republics. The signing of the treaty, however, was interrupted by the August Coup—an attempted coup d'état by hardline members of the government and the KGB who sought to reverse Gorbachev's reforms and reassert the central government's control over the republics. After the coup collapsed, Yeltsin was seen as a hero for his decisive actions, while Gorbachev's power was effectively ended. The balance of power tipped significantly towards the republics. In August 1991, Latvia and Estonia immediately declared the restoration of their full independence (following Lithuania's 1990 example). Gorbachev resigned as general secretary in late August, and soon afterwards, the party's activities were indefinitely suspended—effectively ending its rule. By the fall, Gorbachev could no longer influence events outside Moscow, and he was being challenged even there by Yeltsin, who had been elected President of Russia in July 1991.The remaining 12 republics continued discussing new, increasingly looser, models of the Union. However, by December all except Russia and Kazakhstan had formally declared independence. During this time, Yeltsin took over what remained of the Soviet government, including the Moscow Kremlin. The final blow was struck on 1 December when Ukraine, the second-most powerful republic, voted overwhelmingly for independence. Ukraine's secession ended any realistic chance of the country staying together even on a limited scale.On 8 December 1991, the presidents of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus (formerly Byelorussia), signed the Belavezha Accords, which declared the Soviet Union dissolved and established the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in its place. While doubts remained over the authority of the accords to do this, on 21 December 1991, the representatives of all Soviet republics except Georgia signed the Alma-Ata Protocol, which confirmed the accords. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned as the President of the USSR, declaring the office extinct. He turned the powers that had been vested in the presidency over to Yeltsin. That night, the Soviet flag was lowered for the last time, and the Russian tricolor was raised in its place.The following day, the Supreme Soviet, the highest governmental body, voted both itself and the country out of existence. This is generally recognized as marking the official, final dissolution of the Soviet Union as a functioning state, and the end of the Cold War. The Soviet Army initially remained under overall CIS command but was soon absorbed into the different military forces of the newly independent states. The few remaining Soviet institutions that had not been taken over by Russia ceased to function by the end of 1991.Following the dissolution, Russia was internationally recognized as its legal successor on the international stage. To that end, Russia voluntarily accepted all Soviet foreign debt and claimed Soviet overseas properties as its own. Under the 1992 Lisbon Protocol, Russia also agreed to receive all nuclear weapons remaining in the territory of other former Soviet republics. Since then, the Russian Federation has assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations. Ukraine has refused to recognize exclusive Russian claims to succession of the USSR and claimed such status for Ukraine as well, which was codified in Articles 7 and 8 of its 1991 law On Legal Succession of Ukraine. Since its independence in 1991, Ukraine has continued to pursue claims against Russia in foreign courts, seeking to recover its share of the foreign property that was owned by the USSR.The dissolution was followed by a severe drop in economic and social conditions in post-Soviet states, including a rapid increase in poverty, crime, corruption, unemployment, homelessness, rates of disease, infant mortality and domestic violence, as well as demographic losses and income inequality and the rise of an oligarchical class, along with decreases in calorie intake, life expectancy, adult literacy, and income. Between 1988–1989 and 1993–1995, the Gini ratio increased by an average of 9 points for all former socialist countries. The economic shocks that accompanied wholesale privatization were associated with sharp increases in mortality. Data shows Russia, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia saw a tripling of unemployment and a 42% increase in male death rates between 1991 and 1994. In the following decades, only five or six of the post-communist states are on a path to joining the wealthy capitalist West while most are falling behind, some to such an extent that it will take over fifty years to catch up to where they were before the fall of the Soviet Bloc.In summing up the international ramifications of these events, Vladislav Zubok stated: "The collapse of the Soviet empire was an event of epochal geopolitical, military, ideological, and economic significance." Before the dissolution, the country had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, military strength, economic strength, aid to developing countries, and scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The analysis of the succession of states for the 15 post-Soviet states is complex. The Russian Federation is seen as the legal "continuator" state and is for most purposes the heir to the Soviet Union. It retained ownership of all former Soviet embassy properties, as well as the old Soviet UN membership and permanent membership on the Security Council.Of the two other co-founding states of the USSR at the time of the dissolution, Ukraine was the only one that had passed laws, similar to Russia, that it is a state-successor of both the Ukrainian SSR and the USSR. Soviet treaties laid groundwork for Ukraine's future foreign agreements as well as they led to Ukraine agreeing to undertake 16.37% of debts of the Soviet Union for which it was going to receive its share of USSR's foreign property. Although it had a tough position at the time, due to Russia's position as a "single continuation of the USSR" that became widely accepted in the West as well as a constant pressure from the Western countries, allowed Russia to dispose state property of USSR abroad and conceal information about it. Due to that Ukraine never ratified "zero option" agreement that Russian Federation had signed with other former Soviet republics, as it denied disclosing of information about Soviet Gold Reserves and its Diamond Fund. The dispute over former Soviet property and assets between the two former republics is still ongoing:Similar situation occurred with restitution of cultural property. Although on 14 February 1992 Russia and other former Soviet republics signed agreement "On the return of cultural and historic property to the origin states" in Minsk, it was halted by Russian State Duma that had eventually passed "Federal Law on Cultural Valuables Displaced to the USSR as a Result of the Second World War and Located on the Territory of the Russian Federation" which made restitution currently impossible.There are additionally four states that claim independence from the other internationally recognised post-Soviet states but possess limited international recognition: Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia and Transnistria. The Chechen separatist movement of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria lacks any international recognition.During his rule, Stalin always made the final policy decisions. Otherwise, Soviet foreign policy was set by the commission on the Foreign Policy of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, or by the party's highest body the Politburo. Operations were handled by the separate Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It was known as the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (or Narkomindel), until 1946. The most influential spokesmen were Georgy Chicherin (1872–1936), Maxim Litvinov (1876–1951), Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986), Andrey Vyshinsky (1883–1954) and Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989). Intellectuals were based in the Moscow State Institute of International Relations.The Marxist-Leninist leadership of the Soviet Union intensely debated foreign policy issues and change directions several times. Even after Stalin assumed dictatorial control in the late 1920s, there were debates, and he frequently changed positions.During the country's early period, it was assumed that Communist revolutions would break out soon in every major industrial country, and it was the Soviet responsibility to assist them. The Comintern was the weapon of choice. A few revolutions did break out, but they were quickly suppressed (the longest lasting one was in Hungary)—the Hungarian Soviet Republic—lasted only from 21 March 1919 to 1 August 1919. The Russian Bolsheviks were in no position to give any help.By 1921, Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin realized that capitalism had stabilized itself in Europe and there would not be any widespread revolutions anytime soon. It became the duty of the Russian Bolsheviks to protect what they had in Russia, and avoid military confrontations that might destroy their bridgehead. Russia was now a pariah state, along with Germany. The two came to terms in 1922 with the Treaty of Rapallo that settled long-standing grievances. At the same time, the two countries secretly set up training programs for the illegal German army and air force operations at hidden camps in the USSR.Moscow eventually stopped threatening other states, and instead worked to open peaceful relationships in terms of trade, and diplomatic recognition. The United Kingdom dismissed the warnings of Winston Churchill and a few others about a continuing Marxist-Leninist threat, and opened trade relations and "de facto" diplomatic recognition in 1922. There was hope for a settlement of the pre-war Tsarist debts, but it was repeatedly postponed. Formal recognition came when the new Labour Party came to power in 1924. All the other countries followed suit in opening trade relations. Henry Ford opened large-scale business relations with the Soviets in the late 1920s, hoping that it would lead to long-term peace. Finally, in 1933, the United States officially recognized the USSR, a decision backed by the public opinion and especially by US business interests that expected an opening of a new profitable market.In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Stalin ordered Marxist-Leninist parties across the world to strongly oppose non-Marxist political parties, labor unions or other organizations on the left. Stalin reversed himself in 1934 with the Popular Front program that called on all Marxist parties to join together with all anti-Fascist political, labor, and organizational forces that were opposed to fascism, especially of the Nazi variety.In 1939, half a year after the Munich Agreement, the USSR attempted to form an anti-Nazi alliance with France and Britain. Adolf Hitler proposed a better deal, which would give the USSR control over much of Eastern Europe through the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In September, Germany invaded Poland, and the USSR also invaded later that month, resulting in the partition of Poland. In response, Britain and France declared war on Germany, marking the beginning of World War II.There were three power hierarchies in the Soviet Union: the legislature represented by the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, the government represented by the Council of Ministers, and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), the only legal party and the final policymaker in the country.At the top of the Communist Party was the Central Committee, elected at Party Congresses and Conferences. In turn, the Central Committee voted for a Politburo (called the Presidium between 1952 and 1966), Secretariat and the General Secretary (First Secretary from 1953 to 1966), the "de facto" highest office in the Soviet Union. Depending on the degree of power consolidation, it was either the Politburo as a collective body or the General Secretary, who always was one of the Politburo members, that effectively led the party and the country (except for the period of the highly personalized authority of Stalin, exercised directly through his position in the Council of Ministers rather than the Politburo after 1941). They were not controlled by the general party membership, as the key principle of the party organization was democratic centralism, demanding strict subordination to higher bodies, and elections went uncontested, endorsing the candidates proposed from above.The Communist Party maintained its dominance over the state mainly through its control over the system of appointments. All senior government officials and most deputies of the Supreme Soviet were members of the CPSU. Of the party heads themselves, Stalin (1941–1953) and Khrushchev (1958–1964) were Premiers. Upon the forced retirement of Khrushchev, the party leader was prohibited from this kind of double membership, but the later General Secretaries for at least some part of their tenure occupied the mostly ceremonial position of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, the nominal head of state. The institutions at lower levels were overseen and at times supplanted by primary party organizations.However, in practice the degree of control the party was able to exercise over the state bureaucracy, particularly after the death of Stalin, was far from total, with the bureaucracy pursuing different interests that were at times in conflict with the party. Nor was the party itself monolithic from top to bottom, although factions were officially banned.The Supreme Soviet (successor of the Congress of Soviets) was nominally the highest state body for most of the Soviet history, at first acting as a rubber stamp institution, approving and implementing all decisions made by the party. However, its powers and functions were extended in the late 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, including the creation of new state commissions and committees. It gained additional powers relating to the approval of the Five-Year Plans and the government budget. The Supreme Soviet elected a Presidium (successor of the Central Executive Committee) to wield its power between plenary sessions, ordinarily held twice a year, and appointed the Supreme Court, the Procurator General and the Council of Ministers (known before 1946 as the Council of People's Commissars), headed by the Chairman (Premier) and managing an enormous bureaucracy responsible for the administration of the economy and society. State and party structures of the constituent republics largely emulated the structure of the central institutions, although the Russian SFSR, unlike the other constituent republics, for most of its history had no republican branch of the CPSU, being ruled directly by the union-wide party until 1990. Local authorities were organized likewise into party committees, local Soviets and executive committees. While the state system was nominally federal, the party was unitary.The state security police (the KGB and ) played an important role in Soviet politics. It was instrumental in the Great Purge, but was brought under strict party control after Stalin's death. Under Yuri Andropov, the KGB engaged in the suppression of political dissent and maintained an extensive network of informers, reasserting itself as a political actor to some extent independent of the party-state structure, culminating in the anti-corruption campaign targeting high-ranking party officials in the late 1970s and early 1980s.The constitution, which was promulgated in 1924, 1936 and 1977, did not limit state power. No formal separation of powers existed between the Party, Supreme Soviet and Council of Ministers that represented executive and legislative branches of the government. The system was governed less by statute than by informal conventions, and no settled mechanism of leadership succession existed. Bitter and at times deadly power struggles took place in the Politburo after the deaths of Lenin and Stalin, as well as after Khrushchev's dismissal, itself due to a decision by both the Politburo and the Central Committee. All leaders of the Communist Party before Gorbachev died in office, except Georgy Malenkov and Khrushchev, both dismissed from the party leadership amid internal struggle within the party.Between 1988 and 1990, facing considerable opposition, Mikhail Gorbachev enacted reforms shifting power away from the highest bodies of the party and making the Supreme Soviet less dependent on them. The Congress of People's Deputies was established, the majority of whose members were directly elected in competitive elections held in March 1989. The Congress now elected the Supreme Soviet, which became a full-time parliament, and much stronger than before. For the first time since the 1920s, it refused to rubber stamp proposals from the party and Council of Ministers. In 1990, Gorbachev introduced and assumed the position of the President of the Soviet Union, concentrated power in his executive office, independent of the party, and subordinated the government, now renamed the Cabinet of Ministers of the USSR, to himself.Tensions grew between the Union-wide authorities under Gorbachev, reformists led in Russia by Boris Yeltsin and controlling the newly elected Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR, and communist hardliners. On 19–21 August 1991, a group of hardliners staged a coup attempt. The coup failed, and the State Council of the Soviet Union became the highest organ of state power "in the period of transition". Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary, only remaining President for the final months of the existence of the USSR.The judiciary was not independent of the other branches of government. The Supreme Court supervised the lower courts (People's Court) and applied the law as established by the constitution or as interpreted by the Supreme Soviet. The Constitutional Oversight Committee reviewed the constitutionality of laws and acts. The Soviet Union used the inquisitorial system of Roman law, where the judge, procurator, and defence attorney collaborate to establish the truth.Constitutionally, the USSR was a federation of constituent Union Republics, which were either unitary states, such as Ukraine or Byelorussia (SSRs), or federations, such as Russia or Transcaucasia (SFSRs), all four being the founding republics who signed the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR in December 1922. In 1924, during the national delimitation in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were formed from parts of Russia's Turkestan ASSR and two Soviet dependencies, the Khorezm and Bukharan SSRs. In 1929, Tajikistan was split off from the Uzbekistan SSR. With the constitution of 1936, the Transcaucasian SFSR was dissolved, resulting in its constituent republics of Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan being elevated to Union Republics, while Kazakhstan and Kirghizia were split off from Russian SFSR, resulting in the same status. In August 1940, Moldavia was formed from parts of Ukraine and Bessarabia and northern Bukovina. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (SSRs) were also admitted into the union which was not recognized by most of the international community and was considered an illegal occupation. Karelia was split off from Russia as a Union Republic in March 1940 and was reabsorbed in 1956. Between July 1956 and September 1991, there were 15 union republics (see map below).While nominally a union of equals, in practice the Soviet Union was dominated by Russians. The domination was so absolute that for most of its existence, the country was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to as "Russia". While the RSFSR was technically only one republic within the larger union, it was by far the largest (both in terms of population and area), most powerful, most developed, and the industrial center of the Soviet Union. Historian Matthew White wrote that it was an open secret that the country's federal structure was "window dressing" for Russian dominance. For that reason, the people of the USSR were usually called "Russians", not "Soviets", since "everyone knew who really ran the show".Under the Military Law of September 1925, the Soviet Armed Forces consisted of the Land Forces, the Air Force, the Navy, Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU), and the Internal Troops. The OGPU later became independent and in 1934 joined the NKVD, and so its internal troops were under the joint leadership of the defense and internal commissariats. After World War II, Strategic Missile Forces (1959), Air Defense Forces (1948) and National Civil Defense Forces (1970) were formed, which ranked first, third, and sixth in the official Soviet system of importance (ground forces were second, Air Force Fourth, and Navy Fifth).The army had the greatest political influence. In 1989, there served two million soldiers divided between 150 motorized and 52 armored divisions. Until the early 1960s, the Soviet navy was a rather small military branch, but after the Caribbean crisis, under the leadership of Sergei Gorshkov, it expanded significantly. It became known for battlecruisers and submarines. In 1989 there served 500 000 men. The Soviet Air Force focused on a fleet of strategic bombers and during war situation was to eradicate enemy infrastructure and nuclear capacity. The air force also had a number of fighters and tactical bombers to support the army in the war. Strategic missile forces had more than 1,400 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), deployed between 28 bases and 300 command centers.In the post-war period, the Soviet Army was directly involved in several military operations abroad. These included the suppression of the uprising in East Germany (1953), Hungarian revolution (1956) and the invasion of Czechoslovakia (1968). The Soviet Union also participated in the war in Afghanistan between 1979 and 1989.In the Soviet Union, general conscription applied.At the end of the 1950s, with the help of engineers and technologies captured and imported from defeated Nazi Germany, the Soviets constructed the first satellite – Sputnik 1 and thus overtook the United States in terms of utilizing space. This was followed by other successful satellites, where test dogs flight was sent. On April 12, 1961, the first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, was sent to the space. He once flew around the Earth and successfully landed in the Kazakh steppe. At that time, the first plans for space shuttles and orbital stations were drawn up in Soviet design offices, but in the end personal disputes between designers and management prevented this.As for Lunar space program; USSR only had a program on automated spacecraft launches; with no manned spacecraft used; passing on the "Moon Race" part of Space Race.In the 1970s, specific proposals for the design of the space shuttle began to emerge, but shortcomings, especially in the electronics industry (rapid overheating of electronics), postponed the program until the end of the 1980s. The first shuttle, the Buran, flew in 1988, but without a human crew. Another shuttle, "Ptichka", eventually ended up under construction, as the shuttle project was canceled in 1991. For their launch into space, there is today an unused superpower rocket, Energia, which is the most powerful in the world.In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union managed to build the "Mir" orbital station. It was built on the construction of "Salyut" stations and its only role was civilian-grade research tasks. The Soviet Union adopted a command economy, whereby production and distribution of goods were centralized and directed by the government. The first Bolshevik experience with a command economy was the policy of War communism, which involved the nationalization of industry, centralized distribution of output, coercive requisition of agricultural production, and attempts to eliminate money circulation, private enterprises and free trade. After the severe economic collapse, Lenin replaced war communism by the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1921, legalizing free trade and private ownership of small businesses. The economy quickly recovered as a result.After a long debate among the members of the Politburo about the course of economic development, by 1928–1929, upon gaining control of the country, Stalin abandoned the NEP and pushed for full central planning, starting forced collectivization of agriculture and enacting draconian labor legislation. Resources were mobilized for rapid industrialization, which significantly expanded Soviet capacity in heavy industry and capital goods during the 1930s. The primary motivation for industrialization was preparation for war, mostly due to distrust of the outside capitalist world. As a result, the USSR was transformed from a largely agrarian economy into a great industrial power, leading the way for its emergence as a superpower after World War II. The war caused extensive devastation of the Soviet economy and infrastructure, which required massive reconstruction.By the early 1940s, the Soviet economy had become relatively self-sufficient; for most of the period until the creation of Comecon, only a tiny share of domestic products was traded internationally. After the creation of the Eastern Bloc, external trade rose rapidly. However, the influence of the world economy on the USSR was limited by fixed domestic prices and a state monopoly on foreign trade. Grain and sophisticated consumer manufactures became major import articles from around the 1960s. During the arms race of the Cold War, the Soviet economy was burdened by military expenditures, heavily lobbied for by a powerful bureaucracy dependent on the arms industry. At the same time, the USSR became the largest arms exporter to the Third World. Significant amounts of Soviet resources during the Cold War were allocated in aid to the other socialist states.From the 1930s until its dissolution in late 1991, the way the Soviet economy operated remained essentially unchanged. The economy was formally directed by central planning, carried out by Gosplan and organized in five-year plans. However, in practice, the plans were highly aggregated and provisional, subject to "ad hoc" intervention by superiors. All critical economic decisions were taken by the political leadership. Allocated resources and plan targets were usually denominated in rubles rather than in physical goods. Credit was discouraged, but widespread. The final allocation of output was achieved through relatively decentralized, unplanned contracting. Although in theory prices were legally set from above, in practice they were often negotiated, and informal horizontal links (e.g. between producer factories) were widespread.A number of basic services were state-funded, such as education and health care. In the manufacturing sector, heavy industry and defence were prioritized over consumer goods. Consumer goods, particularly outside large cities, were often scarce, of poor quality and limited variety. Under the command economy, consumers had almost no influence on production, and the changing demands of a population with growing incomes could not be satisfied by supplies at rigidly fixed prices. A massive unplanned second economy grew up at low levels alongside the planned one, providing some of the goods and services that the planners could not. The legalization of some elements of the decentralized economy was attempted with the reform of 1965.Although statistics of the Soviet economy are notoriously unreliable and its economic growth difficult to estimate precisely, by most accounts, the economy continued to expand until the mid-1980s. During the 1950s and 1960s, it had comparatively high growth and was catching up to the West. However, after 1970, the growth, while still positive, steadily declined much more quickly and consistently than in other countries, despite a rapid increase in the capital stock (the rate of capital increase was only surpassed by Japan).Overall, the growth rate of per capita income in the Soviet Union between 1960 and 1989 was slightly above the world average (based on 102 countries). According to Stanley Fischer and William Easterly, growth could have been faster. By their calculation, per capita income in 1989 should have been twice higher than it was, considering the amount of investment, education and population. The authors attribute this poor performance to the low productivity of capital. Steven Rosenfielde states that the standard of living declined due to Stalin's despotism. While there was a brief improvement after his death, it lapsed into stagnation.In 1987, Mikhail Gorbachev attempted to reform and revitalize the economy with his program of "perestroika". His policies relaxed state control over enterprises but did not replace it by market incentives, resulting in a sharp decline in output. The economy, already suffering from reduced petroleum export revenues, started to collapse. Prices were still fixed, and the property was still largely state-owned until after the country's dissolution. For most of the period after World War II until its collapse, Soviet GDP (PPP) was the second-largest in the world, and third during the second half of the 1980s, although on a per-capita basis, it was behind that of First World countries. Compared to countries with similar per-capita GDP in 1928, the Soviet Union experienced significant growth.In 1990, the country had a Human Development Index of 0.920, placing it in the "high" category of human development. It was the third-highest in the Eastern Bloc, behind Czechoslovakia and East Germany, and the 25th in the world of 130 countries.The need for fuel declined in the Soviet Union from the 1970s to the 1980s, both per ruble of gross social product and per ruble of industrial product. At the start, this decline grew very rapidly but gradually slowed down between 1970 and 1975. From 1975 and 1980, it grew even slower, only 2.6%. David Wilson, a historian, believed that the gas industry would account for 40% of Soviet fuel production by the end of the century. His theory did not come to fruition because of the USSR's collapse. The USSR, in theory, would have continued to have an economic growth rate of 2–2.5% during the 1990s because of Soviet energy fields. However, the energy sector faced many difficulties, among them the country's high military expenditure and hostile relations with the First World.In 1991, the Soviet Union had a pipeline network of for crude oil and another for natural gas. Petroleum and petroleum-based products, natural gas, metals, wood, agricultural products, and a variety of manufactured goods, primarily machinery, arms and military equipment, were exported. In the 1970s and 1980s, the USSR heavily relied on fossil fuel exports to earn hard currency. At its peak in 1988, it was the largest producer and second-largest exporter of crude oil, surpassed only by Saudi Arabia.The Soviet Union placed great emphasis on science and technology within its economy, however, the most remarkable Soviet successes in technology, such as producing the world's first space satellite, typically were the responsibility of the military. Lenin believed that the USSR would never overtake the developed world if it remained as technologically backward as it was upon its founding. Soviet authorities proved their commitment to Lenin's belief by developing massive networks, research and development organizations. In the early 1960s, the Soviets awarded 40% of chemistry PhDs to women, compared to only 5% in the United States. By 1989, Soviet scientists were among the world's best-trained specialists in several areas, such as energy physics, selected areas of medicine, mathematics, welding and military technologies. Due to rigid state planning and bureaucracy, the Soviets remained far behind technologically in chemistry, biology, and computers when compared to the First World.Under the Reagan administration, Project Socrates determined that the Soviet Union addressed the acquisition of science and technology in a manner that was radically different from what the US was using. In the case of the US, economic prioritization was being used for indigenous research and development as the means to acquire science and technology in both the private and public sectors. In contrast, the USSR was offensively and defensively maneuvering in the acquisition and utilization of the worldwide technology, to increase the competitive advantage that they acquired from the technology while preventing the US from acquiring a competitive advantage. However, technology-based planning was executed in a centralized, government-centric manner that greatly hindered its flexibility. This was exploited by the US to undermine the strength of the Soviet Union and thus foster its reform.Transport was a vital component of the country's economy. The economic centralization of the late 1920s and 1930s led to the development of infrastructure on a massive scale, most notably the establishment of Aeroflot, an aviation enterprise. The country had a wide variety of modes of transport by land, water and air. However, due to inadequate maintenance, much of the road, water and Soviet civil aviation transport were outdated and technologically backward compared to the First World.Soviet rail transport was the largest and most intensively used in the world; it was also better developed than most of its Western counterparts. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, Soviet economists were calling for the construction of more roads to alleviate some of the burdens from the railways and to improve the Soviet government budget. The street network and automotive industry remained underdeveloped, and dirt roads were common outside major cities. Soviet maintenance projects proved unable to take care of even the few roads the country had. By the early-to-mid-1980s, the Soviet authorities tried to solve the road problem by ordering the construction of new ones. Meanwhile, the automobile industry was growing at a faster rate than road construction. The underdeveloped road network led to a growing demand for public transport.Despite improvements, several aspects of the transport sector were still riddled with problems due to outdated infrastructure, lack of investment, corruption and bad decision-making. Soviet authorities were unable to meet the growing demand for transport infrastructure and services.The Soviet merchant navy was one of the largest in the world.Excess deaths throughout World War I and the Russian Civil War (including the postwar famine) amounted to a combined total of 18 million, some 10 million in the 1930s, and more than 26 million in 1941–5. The postwar Soviet population was 45 to 50 million smaller than it would have been if pre-war demographic growth had continued. According to Catherine Merridale, "... reasonable estimate would place the total number of excess deaths for the whole period somewhere around 60 million."The birth rate of the USSR decreased from 44.0 per thousand in 1926 to 18.0 in 1974, mainly due to increasing urbanization and the rising average age of marriages. The mortality rate demonstrated a gradual decrease as well – from 23.7 per thousand in 1926 to 8.7 in 1974. In general, the birth rates of the southern republics in Transcaucasia and Central Asia were considerably higher than those in the northern parts of the Soviet Union, and in some cases even increased in the post–World War II period, a phenomenon partly attributed to slower rates of urbanistion and traditionally earlier marriages in the southern republics. Soviet Europe moved towards sub-replacement fertility, while Soviet Central Asia continued to exhibit population growth well above replacement-level fertility.The late 1960s and the 1970s witnessed a reversal of the declining trajectory of the rate of mortality in the USSR, and was especially notable among men of working age, but was also prevalent in Russia and other predominantly Slavic areas of the country. An analysis of the official data from the late 1980s showed that after worsening in the late-1970s and the early 1980s, adult mortality began to improve again. The infant mortality rate increased from 24.7 in 1970 to 27.9 in 1974. Some researchers regarded the rise as mostly real, a consequence of worsening health conditions and services. The rises in both adult and infant mortality were not explained or defended by Soviet officials, and the Soviet government stopped publishing all mortality statistics for ten years. Soviet demographers and health specialists remained silent about the mortality increases until the late-1980s, when the publication of mortality data resumed, and researchers could delve into the real causes.Under Lenin, the state made explicit commitments to promote the equality of men and women. Many early Russian feminists and ordinary Russian working women actively participated in the Revolution, and many more were affected by the events of that period and the new policies. Beginning in October 1918, Lenin's government liberalized divorce and abortion laws, decriminalized homosexuality (re-criminalized in the 1930s), permitted cohabitation, and ushered in a host of reforms. However, without birth control, the new system produced many broken marriages, as well as countless out-of-wedlock children. The epidemic of divorces and extramarital affairs created social hardships when Soviet leaders wanted people to concentrate their efforts on growing the economy. Giving women control over their fertility also led to a precipitous decline in the birth rate, perceived as a threat to their country's military power. By 1936, Stalin reversed most of the liberal laws, ushering in a pronatalist era that lasted for decades.By 1917, Russia became the first great power to grant women the right to vote. After heavy casualties in World War I and II, women outnumbered men in Russia by a 4:3 ratio. This contributed to the larger role women played in Russian society compared to other great powers at the time.Anatoly Lunacharsky became the first People's Commissar for Education of Soviet Russia. In the beginning, the Soviet authorities placed great emphasis on the elimination of illiteracy. All left-handed children were forced to write with their right hand in the Soviet school system. Literate people were automatically hired as teachers. For a short period, quality was sacrificed for quantity. By 1940, Stalin could announce that illiteracy had been eliminated. Throughout the 1930s, social mobility rose sharply, which has been attributed to reforms in education. In the aftermath of World War II, the country's educational system expanded dramatically, which had a tremendous effect. In the 1960s, nearly all children had access to education, the only exception being those living in remote areas. Nikita Khrushchev tried to make education more accessible, making it clear to children that education was closely linked to the needs of society. Education also became important in giving rise to the New Man. Citizens directly entering the workforce had the constitutional right to a job and to free vocational training.The education system was highly centralized and universally accessible to all citizens, with affirmative action for applicants from nations associated with cultural backwardness. However, as part of the general antisemitic policy, an unofficial Jewish quota was applied in the leading institutions of higher education by subjecting Jewish applicants to harsher entrance examinations. The Brezhnev era also introduced a rule that required all university applicants to present a reference from the local Komsomol party secretary. According to statistics from 1986, the number of higher education students per the population of 10,000 was 181 for the USSR, compared to 517 for the US.The Soviet Union was an ethnically diverse country, with more than 100 distinct ethnic groups. The total population of the country was estimated at 293 million in 1991. According to a 1990 estimate, the majority of the population were Russians (50.78%), followed by Ukrainians (15.45%) and Uzbeks (5.84%).All citizens of the USSR had their own ethnic affiliation. The ethnicity of a person was chosen at the age of sixteen by the child's parents. If the parents did not agree, the child was automatically assigned the ethnicity of the father. Partly due to Soviet policies, some of the smaller minority ethnic groups were considered part of larger ones, such as the Mingrelians of Georgia, who were classified with the linguistically related Georgians. Some ethnic groups voluntarily assimilated, while others were brought in by force. Russians, Belarusians, and Ukrainians, who were all East Slavic and Orthodox, shared close cultural, ethnic, and religious ties, while other groups did not. With multiple nationalities living in the same territory, ethnic antagonisms developed over the years.Members of various ethnicities participated in legislative bodies. Organs of power like the Politburo, the Secretariat of the Central Committee etc., were formally ethnically neutral, but in reality, ethnic Russians were overrepresented, although there were also non-Russian leaders in the Soviet leadership, such as Joseph Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev, Nikolai Podgorny or Andrei Gromyko. During the Soviet era, a significant number of ethnic Russians and Ukrainians migrated to other Soviet republics, and many of them settled there. According to the last census in 1989, the Russian "diaspora" in the Soviet republics had reached 25 million.In 1917, before the revolution, health conditions were significantly behind those of developed countries. As Lenin later noted, "Either the lice will defeat socialism, or socialism will defeat the lice". The Soviet principle of health care was conceived by the People's Commissariat for Health in 1918. Health care was to be controlled by the state and would be provided to its citizens free of charge, a revolutionary concept at the time. Article 42 of the 1977 Soviet Constitution gave all citizens the right to health protection and free access to any health institutions in the USSR. Before Leonid Brezhnev became General Secretary, the Soviet healthcare system was held in high esteem by many foreign specialists. This changed, however, from Brezhnev's accession and Mikhail Gorbachev's tenure as leader, during which the health care system was heavily criticized for many basic faults, such as the quality of service and the unevenness in its provision. Minister of Health Yevgeniy Chazov, during the 19th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, while highlighting such successes as having the most doctors and hospitals in the world, recognized the system's areas for improvement and felt that billions of Soviet rubles were squandered. After the revolution, life expectancy for all age groups went up. This statistic in itself was seen by some that the socialist system was superior to the capitalist system. These improvements continued into the 1960s when statistics indicated that the life expectancy briefly surpassed that of the United States. Life expectancy started to decline in the 1970s, possibly because of alcohol abuse. At the same time, infant mortality began to rise. After 1974, the government stopped publishing statistics on the matter. This trend can be partly explained by the number of pregnancies rising drastically in the Asian part of the country where infant mortality was the highest while declining markedly in the more developed European part of the Soviet Union.Soviet dental technology and dental health were considered notoriously bad. In 1991, the average 35-year-old had 12 to 14 cavities, fillings or missing teeth. Toothpaste was often not available, and toothbrushes did not conform to standards of modern dentistry.Under Lenin, the government gave small language groups their own writing systems. The development of these writing systems was highly successful, even though some flaws were detected. During the later days of the USSR, countries with the same multilingual situation implemented similar policies. A serious problem when creating these writing systems was that the languages differed dialectally greatly from each other. When a language had been given a writing system and appeared in a notable publication, it would attain "official language" status. There were many minority languages which never received their own writing system; therefore, their speakers were forced to have a second language. There are examples where the government retreated from this policy, most notably under Stalin where education was discontinued in languages that were not widespread. These languages were then assimilated into another language, mostly Russian. During World War II, some minority languages were banned, and their speakers accused of collaborating with the enemy.As the most widely spoken of the Soviet Union's many languages, Russian "de facto" functioned as an official language, as the "language of interethnic communication" (), but only assumed the "de jure" status as the official national language in 1990.Christianity and Islam had the highest number of adherents among the religious citizens. Eastern Christianity predominated among Christians, with Russia's traditional Russian Orthodox Church being the largest Christian denomination. About 90% of the Soviet Union's Muslims were Sunnis, with Shias being concentrated in the Azerbaijan SSR. Smaller groups included Roman Catholics, Jews, Buddhists, and a variety of Protestant denominations (especially Baptists and Lutherans).Religious influence had been strong in the Russian Empire. The Russian Orthodox Church enjoyed a privileged status as the church of the monarchy and took part in carrying out official state functions. The immediate period following the establishment of the Soviet state included a struggle against the Orthodox Church, which the revolutionaries considered an ally of the former ruling classes.In Soviet law, the "freedom to hold religious services" was constitutionally guaranteed, although the ruling Communist Party regarded religion as incompatible with the Marxist spirit of scientific materialism. In practice, the Soviet system subscribed to a narrow interpretation of this right, and in fact utilized a range of official measures to discourage religion and curb the activities of religious groups.The 1918 Council of People's Commissars decree establishing the Russian SFSR as a secular state also decreed that "the teaching of religion in all [places] where subjects of general instruction are taught, is forbidden. Citizens may teach and may be taught religion privately." Among further restrictions, those adopted in 1929 included express prohibitions on a range of church activities, including meetings for organized Bible study. Both Christian and non-Christian establishments were shut down by the thousands in the 1920s and 1930s. By 1940, as many as 90% of the churches, synagogues, and mosques that had been operating in 1917 were closed.Under the doctrine of state atheism, a "government-sponsored program of forced conversion to atheism" was conducted. The government targeted religions based on state interests, and while most organized religions were never outlawed, religious property was confiscated, believers were harassed, and religion was ridiculed while atheism was propagated in schools. In 1925, the government founded the League of Militant Atheists to intensify the propaganda campaign. Accordingly, although personal expressions of religious faith were not explicitly banned, a strong sense of social stigma was imposed on them by the formal structures and mass media, and it was generally considered unacceptable for members of certain professions (teachers, state bureaucrats, soldiers) to be openly religious. While persecution accelerated following Stalin's rise to power, a revival of Orthodoxy was fostered by the government during World War II and the Soviet authorities sought to control the Russian Orthodox Church rather than liquidate it. During the first five years of Soviet power, the Bolsheviks executed 28 Russian Orthodox bishops and over 1,200 Russian Orthodox priests. Many others were imprisoned or exiled. Believers were harassed and persecuted. Most seminaries were closed, and the publication of most religious material was prohibited. By 1941, only 500 churches remained open out of about 54,000 in existence before World War I.Convinced that religious anti-Sovietism had become a thing of the past, and with the looming threat of war, the Stalin regime began shifting to a more moderate religion policy in the late 1930s. Soviet religious establishments overwhelmingly rallied to support the war effort during World War II. Amid other accommodations to religious faith after the German invasion, churches were reopened. Radio Moscow began broadcasting a religious hour, and a historic meeting between Stalin and Orthodox Church leader Patriarch Sergius of Moscow was held in 1943. Stalin had the support of the majority of the religious people in the USSR even through the late 1980s. The general tendency of this period was an increase in religious activity among believers of all faiths.Under Nikita Khrushchev, the state leadership clashed with the churches in 1958–1964, a period when atheism was emphasized in the educational curriculum, and numerous state publications promoted atheistic views. During this period, the number of churches fell from 20,000 to 10,000 from 1959 to 1965, and the number of synagogues dropped from 500 to 97. The number of working mosques also declined, falling from 1,500 to 500 within a decade.Religious institutions remained monitored by the Soviet government, but churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques were all given more leeway in the Brezhnev era. Official relations between the Orthodox Church and the government again warmed to the point that the Brezhnev government twice honored Orthodox Patriarch Alexy I with the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. A poll conducted by Soviet authorities in 1982 recorded 20% of the Soviet population as "active religious believers."The legacy of the USSR remains a controversial topic. The socio-economic nature of communist states such as the USSR, especially under Stalin, has also been much debated, varyingly being labelled a form of bureaucratic collectivism, state capitalism, state socialism, or a totally unique mode of production.The USSR implemented a broad range of policies over a long period of time, with a large amount of conflicting policies being implemented by different leaders. Some have a positive view of it whilst others are critical towards the country, calling it a repressive oligarchy. The opinions on the USSR are complex and have changed over time, with different generations having different views on the matter as well as on Soviet policies corresponding to separate time periods during its history. Leftists have largely varying views on the USSR. Whilst some leftists such as anarchists and other libertarian socialists, agree it did not give the workers control over the means of production and was a centralized oligarchy, others have more positive opinions as to the Bolshevik policies and Vladimir Lenin. Many anti-Stalinist leftists such as anarchists are extremely critical of Soviet authoritarianism and repression. Much of the criticism it receives is centered around massacres in the Soviet Union, the centralized hierarchy present in the USSR and mass political repression as well as violence towards government critics and political dissidents such as other leftists. Critics also point towards its failure to implement any substantial worker cooperatives or implementing worker liberation as well as corruption and the Soviet authoritarian nature.Many Russians and other former Soviet citizens have nostalgia for the USSR, pointing towards most infrastructure being built during Soviet times, increased job security, increased literacy rate, increased caloric intake and supposed ethnic pluralism enacted in the Soviet Union as well as political stability. The Russian Revolution is also seen in a positive light as well as the leadership of Lenin, Nikita Khrushchev and the later USSR, although many view Joseph Stalin's rule as positive for the country. In Armenia, 12% of respondents said the USSR collapse did good, while 66% said it did harm. In Kyrgyzstan, 16% of respondents said the collapse of the USSR did good, while 61% said it did harm. In a 2018 Rating Sociological Group poll, 47% of Ukrainian respondents had a positive opinion of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, who ruled the Soviet Union from 1964 to 1982. Much of the admiration of the USSR comes from the failings of the modern post-Soviet governments such as the control by oligarchs, corruption and outdated Soviet-era infrastructure as well as the rise and dominance of organised crime after the collapse of the USSR all directly leading into nostalgia for it.The 1941–45 period of World War II is still known in Russia as the "Great Patriotic War". The war became a topic of great importance in cinema, literature, history lessons at school, the mass media, and the arts. As a result of the massive losses suffered by the military and civilians during the conflict, Victory Day celebrated on 9 May is still one of the most important and emotional dates in Russia.In some post Soviet republics, there is a more negative view of the USSR, although there is no unanimity on the matter. In large part due to the Holodomor, ethnic Ukrainians have a negative view of it. Russian-speaking Ukrainians of Ukraine's southern and eastern regions have a more positive view of the USSR. In some countries with internal conflict, there is also nostalgia for the USSR, especially for refugees of the post-Soviet conflicts who have been forced to flee their homes and have been displaced. This nostalgia is less an admiration for the country or its policies than it is a longing to return to their homes and not to live in poverty. The many Russian enclaves in the former USSR republics such as Transnistria have in a general a positive remembrance of it.The left's view of the USSR is complex. While some leftists regard the USSR as an example of state capitalism or that it was an oligarchical state, other leftists admire Vladimir Lenin and the Russian Revolution.Council communists generally view the USSR as failing to create class consciousness, turning into a corrupt state in which the elite controlled society. Anarchists are critical of the country, labeling the Soviet system as "red fascism". Soviets actively destroyed anarchist organizations and anarchist communities, labeling anarchists as "enemies of the people". Factors contributing to the animosity towards the USSR included: the Soviet invasion of the anarchist Free Territory, the suppression of the anarchist Kronstadt rebellion and the response to the Norilsk uprising, in which prisoners created a radical system of government based on cooperatives and direct democracy in the Gulag. Anarchist organizations and unions were also banned during the Spanish Civil War under the Republican government by orders from the Soviet government. Due to this, anarchists generally hold a large animosity towards the USSR.The culture of the Soviet Union passed through several stages during the USSR's existence. During the first decade following the revolution, there was relative freedom and artists experimented with several different styles to find a distinctive Soviet style of art. Lenin wanted art to be accessible to the Russian people. On the other hand, hundreds of intellectuals, writers, and artists were exiled or executed, and their work banned, such as Nikolay Gumilyov who was shot for alleged conspiring against the Bolshevik regime, and Yevgeny Zamyatin.The government encouraged a variety of trends. In art and literature, numerous schools, some traditional and others radically experimental, proliferated. Communist writers Maxim Gorky and Vladimir Mayakovsky were active during this time. As a means of influencing a largely illiterate society, films received encouragement from the state, and much of director Sergei Eisenstein's best work dates from this period.During Stalin's rule, the Soviet culture was characterized by the rise and domination of the government-imposed style of socialist realism, with all other trends being severely repressed, with rare exceptions, such as Mikhail Bulgakov's works. Many writers were imprisoned and killed.Following the Khrushchev Thaw, censorship was diminished. During this time, a distinctive period of Soviet culture developed, characterized by conformist public life and an intense focus on personal life. Greater experimentation in art forms was again permissible, resulting in the production of more sophisticated and subtly critical work. The regime loosened its emphasis on socialist realism; thus, for instance, many protagonists of the novels of author Yury Trifonov concerned themselves with problems of daily life rather than with building socialism. Underground dissident literature, known as "samizdat", developed during this late period. In architecture, the Khrushchev era mostly focused on functional design as opposed to the highly decorated style of Stalin's epoch. In music, in response to the increasing popularity of forms of popular music like jazz in the West, many jazz orchestras were permitted throughout the USSR, notably the Melodiya Ensemble, named after the principle record label in the USSR.In the second half of the 1980s, Gorbachev's policies of "perestroika" and "glasnost" significantly expanded freedom of expression throughout the country in the media and the press.Founded on 20 July 1924 in Moscow, "Sovetsky Sport" was the first sports newspaper of the Soviet Union.The Soviet Olympic Committee formed on 21 April 1951, and the IOC recognized the new body in its 45th session. In the same year, when the Soviet representative Konstantin Andrianov became an IOC member, the USSR officially joined the Olympic Movement. The 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki thus became first Olympic Games for Soviet athletes. The Soviet Union was the biggest rival to the United States at the Summer Olympics, winning six of its nine appearances at the games and also topping the medal tally at the Winter Olympics six times. The Soviet Union's Olympics success has been attributed to its large investment in sports to demonstrate its superpower image and political influence on a global stage.The Soviet Union national ice hockey team won nearly every world championship and Olympic tournament between 1954 and 1991 and never failed to medal in any International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) tournament in which they competed.The advent of the state-sponsored "full-time amateur athlete" of the Eastern Bloc countries further eroded the ideology of the pure amateur, as it put the self-financed amateurs of the Western countries at a disadvantage. The Soviet Union entered teams of athletes who were all nominally students, soldiers, or working in a profession – in reality, the state paid many of these competitors to train on a full-time basis. Nevertheless, the IOC held to the traditional rules regarding amateurism.A 1989 report by a committee of the Australian Senate claimed that "there is hardly a medal winner at the Moscow Games, certainly not a gold medal winner...who is not on one sort of drug or another: usually several kinds. The Moscow Games might well have been called the Chemists' Games".A member of the IOC Medical Commission, Manfred Donike, privately ran additional tests with a new technique for identifying abnormal levels of testosterone by measuring its ratio to epitestosterone in urine. Twenty percent of the specimens he tested, including those from sixteen gold medalists, would have resulted in disciplinary proceedings had the tests been official. The results of Donike's unofficial tests later convinced the IOC to add his new technique to their testing protocols. The first documented case of "blood doping" occurred at the 1980 Summer Olympics when a runner was transfused with two pints of blood before winning medals in the 5000 m and 10,000 m.Documentation obtained in 2016 revealed the Soviet Union's plans for a statewide doping system in track and field in preparation for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Dated before the decision to boycott the 1984 Games, the document detailed the existing steroids operations of the program, along with suggestions for further enhancements. Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture prepared the communication, directed to the Soviet Union's head of track and field. Portugalov later became one of the leading figures involved in the implementation of Russian doping before the 2016 Summer Olympics.Official Soviet environmental policy has always attached great importance to actions in which human beings actively improve nature. Lenin's quote "Communism is Soviet power and electrification of the country!" in many respects summarizes the focus on modernization and industrial development. During the first five-year plan in 1928, Stalin proceeded to industrialize the country at all costs. Values such as environmental and nature protection have been completely ignored in the struggle to create a modern industrial society. After Stalin's death, they focused more on environmental issues, but the basic perception of the value of environmental protection remained the same.The Soviet media has always focused on the vast expanse of land and the virtually indestructible natural resources. This made it feel that contamination and uncontrolled exploitation of nature were not a problem. The Soviet state also firmly believed that scientific and technological progress would solve all the problems. Official ideology said that under socialism environmental problems could easily be overcome, unlike capitalist countries, where they seemingly could not be solved. The Soviet authorities had an almost unwavering belief that man could transcend nature. However, when the authorities had to admit that there were environmental problems in the USSR in the 1980s, they explained the problems in such a way that socialism had not yet been fully developed; pollution in a socialist society was only a temporary anomaly that would have been resolved if socialism had developed.The Chernobyl disaster in 1986 was the first major accident at a civilian nuclear power plant. Unparalleled in the world, it resulted in a large number of radioactive isotopes being released into the atmosphere. Radioactive doses have scattered relatively far. 4,000 new cases of thyroid cancer were reported after the incident, but this led to a relatively low number of deaths (WHO data, 2005). However, the long-term effects of the accident are unknown. Another major accident is the Kyshtym disaster.After the fall of the USSR, it was discovered that the environmental problems were greater than what the Soviet authorities admitted. The Kola Peninsula was one of the places with clear problems. Around the industrial cities of Monchegorsk and Norilsk, where nickel, for example, is mined, all forests have been destroyed by contamination, while the northern and other parts of Russia have been affected by emissions. During the 1990s, people in the West were also interested in the radioactive hazards of nuclear facilities, decommissioned nuclear submarines, and the processing of nuclear waste or spent nuclear fuel. It was also known in the early 1990s that the USSR had transported radioactive material to the Barents Sea and Kara Sea, which was later confirmed by the Russian parliament. The crash of the K-141 Kursk submarine in 2000 in the west further raised concerns. In the past, there were accidents involving submarines K-19, K-8, and K-129.
|
[
"Georgy Malenkov",
"Alexei Kosygin",
"Nikolai Ryzhkov",
"Joseph Stalin",
"Alexei Rykov",
"Ivan Silayev",
"Vladimir Lenin",
"Nikolai Bulganin",
"Nikolai Tikhonov",
"Vyacheslav Molotov",
"Valentin Pavlov"
] |
|
Who was the head of Soviet Union in 18/03/1959?
|
March 18, 1959
|
{
"text": [
"Nikita Khrushchev"
]
}
|
L2_Q15180_P6_6
|
Nikolai Bulganin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1955 to Mar, 1958.
Nikolai Tikhonov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1980 to Sep, 1985.
Ivan Silayev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1991 to Dec, 1991.
Alexei Kosygin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1964 to Oct, 1980.
Valentin Pavlov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jan, 1991 to Aug, 1991.
Nikolai Ryzhkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1985 to Jan, 1991.
Georgy Malenkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1953 to Feb, 1955.
Alexei Rykov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1924 to Dec, 1930.
Vyacheslav Molotov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Dec, 1930 to May, 1941.
Joseph Stalin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from May, 1941 to Mar, 1953.
Nikita Khrushchev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1958 to Oct, 1964.
Vladimir Lenin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jul, 1923 to Jan, 1924.
|
Soviet UnionThe Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a socialist state that spanned most of Europe and Asia during its existence from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a federal union of multiple national republics; in practice its government and economy were highly centralized until its final years. The country was a one-party state prior to 1990 governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with Moscow as its capital within its largest and most populous republic, the Russian SFSR. Other major urban centers were Leningrad (Russian SFSR), Kiev (Ukrainian SSR), Minsk (Byelorussian SSR), Tashkent (Uzbek SSR), Alma-Ata (Kazakh SSR) and Novosibirsk (Russian SFSR). It was the largest country in the world, covering over , and spanning eleven time zones. The Soviet Union's five biomes were tundra, taiga, steppes, desert, and mountains. Its diverse population was officially known as the Soviet people.The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 when the Bolsheviks, headed by Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Provisional Government that had earlier replaced the monarchy of the Russian Empire. They established the Russian Soviet Republic, beginning a civil war between the Bolshevik Red Army and many anti-Bolshevik forces across the former Empire, among whom the largest faction was the White Guard, which engaged in violent anti-communist repression against the Bolsheviks and their worker and peasant supporters known as the White Terror. The Red Army expanded and helped local Bolsheviks take power, establishing soviets, repressing their political opponents and rebellious peasants through Red Terror. By 1922, the Bolsheviks had emerged victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian republics. The New Economic Policy (NEP), which was introduced by Lenin, led to a partial return of a free market and private property; this resulted in a period of economic recovery.Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power. Stalin suppressed all political opposition to his rule inside the Communist Party and inaugurated a command economy. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and forced collectivization, which led to significant economic growth, but also led to a man-made famine in 1932–1933 and expanded the Gulag labour camp system originally established in 1918. Stalin also fomented political paranoia and conducted the Great Purge to remove his actual and perceived opponents from the Party through mass arrests of military leaders, Communist Party members, and ordinary citizens alike, who were then sent to correctional labor camps or sentenced to death.On 23 August 1939, after unsuccessful efforts to form an anti-fascist alliance with Western powers, the Soviets signed the non-aggression agreement with Nazi Germany. After the start of World War II, the formally neutral Soviets invaded and annexed territories of several Eastern European states, including eastern Poland and the Baltic states. In June 1941 the Germans invaded, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the cost of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at intense battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin and won World War II in Europe on 9 May 1945. The territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged in 1947 as a result of a post-war Soviet dominance in Eastern Europe, where the Eastern Bloc confronted the Western Bloc that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949.Following Stalin's death in 1953, a period known as de-Stalinization and the Khrushchev Thaw occurred under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev. The country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took an early lead in the Space Race with the first ever satellite and the first human spaceflight and the first probe to land on another planet, Venus. In the 1970s, there was a brief "détente" of relations with the United States, but tensions resumed when the Soviet Union deployed troops in Afghanistan in 1979. The war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters.In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to further reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of "glasnost" and "perestroika". The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing economic stagnation. The Cold War ended during his tenure and in 1989, Warsaw Pact countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective Marxist-Leninist regimes. Strong nationalist and separatist movements broke out across the USSR. Gorbachev initiated a referendum—boycotted by the Baltic republics, Armenia, Georgia, and Moldova—which resulted in the majority of participating citizens voting in favor of preserving the Union as a renewed federation. In August 1991, a coup d'état was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a high-profile role in facing down the coup. The main result was the banning of the Communist Party. The republics led by Russia and Ukraine declared independence. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned. All the republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states. The Russian Federation (formerly the Russian SFSR) assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations and is recognized as its continued legal personality in world affairs.The USSR produced many significant social and technological achievements and innovations regarding military power. It boasted the world's second-largest economy and the largest standing military in the world. The USSR was recognized as one of the five nuclear weapons states. It was a founding permanent member of the United Nations Security Council as well as a member of the OSCE, the WFTU and the leading member of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the Warsaw Pact.Before its dissolution, the USSR had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II. Sometimes also called "Soviet Empire", it exercised its hegemony in Eastern Europe and worldwide with military and economic strength, proxy conflicts and influence in developing countries and funding of scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The word "soviet" is derived from the Russian word "sovet" (), meaning "council", "assembly", "advice", ultimately deriving from the proto-Slavic verbal stem of "vět-iti" ("to inform"), related to Slavic "věst" ("news"), English "wise", the root in "ad-vis-or" (which came to English through French), or the Dutch "weten" ("to know"; cf. "wetenschap" meaning "science"). The word "sovietnik" means "councillor".Some organizations in Russian history were called "council" (). In the Russian Empire, the State Council which functioned from 1810 to 1917 was referred to as a Council of Ministers after the revolt of 1905.During the Georgian Affair, Vladimir Lenin envisioned an expression of Great Russian ethnic chauvinism by Joseph Stalin and his supporters, calling for these nation-states to join Russia as semi-independent parts of a greater union which he initially named as the Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia (). Stalin initially resisted the proposal but ultimately accepted it, although with Lenin's agreement changed the name to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), albeit all the republics began as "socialist soviet" and did not change to the other order until 1936. In addition, in the national languages of several republics, the word "council" or "conciliar" in the respective language was only quite late changed to an adaptation of the Russian "soviet" and never in others, e.g. Ukraine."СССР" (in Latin alphabet: "SSSR") is the abbreviation of USSR in Russian. It is written in Cyrillic letters. The Soviets used the Cyrillic abbreviation so frequently that audiences worldwide became familiar with its meaning. Notably, both Cyrillic letters used have homoglyphic (but transliterally distinct) letters in Latin alphabets. Because of widespread familiarity with the Cyrillic abbreviation, Latin alphabet users in particular almost always use the Latin homoglyphs "C" and "P" (as opposed to the transliteral Latin letters "S" and "R") when rendering the USSR's native abbreviation.After "СССР", the most common short form names for the Soviet state in Russian were "Советский Союз" (transliteration: "Sovetskiy Soyuz") which literally means "Soviet Union", and also "Союз ССР" (transliteration: "Soyuz SSR") which, after compensating for grammatical differences, essentially translates to "Union of SSR's" in English.In the English language media, the state was referred to as the Soviet Union or the USSR. In other European languages, the locally translated short forms and abbreviations are usually used such as "Union soviétique" and "URSS" in French, or "Sowjetunion" and "UdSSR" in German. In the English-speaking world, the Soviet Union was also informally called Russia and its citizens Russians, although that was technically incorrect since Russia was only one of the republics. Such misapplications of the linguistic equivalents to the term "Russia" and its derivatives were frequent in other languages as well.The Soviet Union covered an area of over , and was the world's largest country, a status that is retained by its successor state, Russia. It covered a sixth of Earth's land surface, and its size was comparable to the continent of North America. Its western part in Europe accounted for a quarter of the country's area and was the cultural and economic center. The eastern part in Asia extended to the Pacific Ocean to the east and Afghanistan to the south, and, except some areas in Central Asia, was much less populous. It spanned over east to west across eleven time zones, and over north to south. It had five climate zones: tundra, taiga, steppes, desert and mountains.The Soviet Union, similarly to Russia, had the world's longest border, measuring over , or circumferences of Earth. Two-thirds of it was a coastline. The country bordered Afghanistan, China, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Hungary, Iran, Mongolia, North Korea, Norway, Poland, Romania, and Turkey from 1945 to 1991. The Bering Strait separated the country from the United States, while the La Pérouse Strait separated it from Japan.The Soviet Union's highest mountain was Communism Peak (now Ismoil Somoni Peak) in Tajik SSR, at . It also included most of the world's largest lakes; the Caspian Sea (shared with Iran), and Lake Baikal in Russia, the world's largest and deepest freshwater lake.Modern revolutionary activity in the Russian Empire began with the 1825 Decembrist revolt. Although serfdom was abolished in 1861, it was done on terms unfavorable to the peasants and served to encourage revolutionaries. A parliament—the State Duma—was established in 1906 after the Russian Revolution of 1905, but Tsar Nicholas II resisted attempts to move from absolute to a constitutional monarchy. Social unrest continued and was aggravated during World War I by military defeat and food shortages in major cities.A spontaneous popular uprising in Petrograd, in response to the wartime decay of Russia's economy and morale, culminated in the February Revolution and the toppling of Nicholas II and the imperial government in March 1917. The tsarist autocracy was replaced by the Russian Provisional Government, which intended to conduct elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly and to continue fighting on the side of the Entente in World War I.At the same time, workers' councils, known in Russian as "Soviets", sprang up across the country. The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, pushed for socialist revolution in the Soviets and on the streets. On 7 November 1917, the Red Guards stormed the Winter Palace in Petrograd, ending the rule of the Provisional Government and leaving all political power to the Soviets. This event would later be officially known in Soviet bibliographies as the Great October Socialist Revolution. In December, the Bolsheviks signed an armistice with the Central Powers, though by February 1918, fighting had resumed. In March, the Soviets ended involvement in the war and signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.A long and bloody Civil War ensued between the Reds and the Whites, starting in 1917 and ending in 1923 with the Reds' victory. It included foreign intervention, the execution of the former tsar and his family, and the famine of 1921, which killed about five million people. In March 1921, during a related conflict with Poland, the Peace of Riga was signed, splitting disputed territories in Belarus and Ukraine between the Republic of Poland and Soviet Russia. Soviet Russia had to resolve similar conflicts with the newly established republics of Estonia, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania.On 28 December 1922, a conference of plenipotentiary delegations from the Russian SFSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR approved the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and the Declaration of the Creation of the USSR, forming the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. These two documents were confirmed by the first Congress of Soviets of the USSR and signed by the heads of the delegations, Mikhail Kalinin, Mikhail Tskhakaya, Mikhail Frunze, Grigory Petrovsky, and Alexander Chervyakov, on 30 December 1922. The formal proclamation was made from the stage of the Bolshoi Theatre.An intensive restructuring of the economy, industry and politics of the country began in the early days of Soviet power in 1917. A large part of this was done according to the Bolshevik Initial Decrees, government documents signed by Vladimir Lenin. One of the most prominent breakthroughs was the GOELRO plan, which envisioned a major restructuring of the Soviet economy based on total electrification of the country. The plan became the prototype for subsequent Five-Year Plans and was fulfilled by 1931. After the economic policy of "War communism" during the Russian Civil War, as a prelude to fully developing socialism in the country, the Soviet government permitted some private enterprise to coexist alongside nationalized industry in the 1920s, and total food requisition in the countryside was replaced by a food tax.From its creation, the government in the Soviet Union was based on the one-party rule of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks). The stated purpose was to prevent the return of capitalist exploitation, and that the principles of democratic centralism would be the most effective in representing the people's will in a practical manner. The debate over the future of the economy provided the background for a power struggle in the years after Lenin's death in 1924. Initially, Lenin was to be replaced by a "troika" consisting of Grigory Zinoviev of the Ukrainian SSR, Lev Kamenev of the Russian SFSR, and Joseph Stalin of the Transcaucasian SFSR.On 1 February 1924, the USSR was recognized by the United Kingdom. The same year, a Soviet Constitution was approved, legitimizing the December 1922 union. According to Archie Brown the constitution was never an accurate guide to political reality in the USSR. For example the fact that the Party played the leading role in making and enforcing policy was not mentioned in it until 1977. The USSR was a federative entity of many constituent republics, each with its own political and administrative entities. However, the term "Soviet Russia"strictly applicable only to the Russian Federative Socialist Republicwas often applied to the entire country by non-Soviet writers.On 3 April 1922, Stalin was named the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Lenin had appointed Stalin the head of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate, which gave Stalin considerable power. By gradually consolidating his influence and isolating and outmanoeuvring his rivals within the party, Stalin became the undisputed leader of the country and, by the end of the 1920s, established a totalitarian rule. In October 1927, Zinoviev and Leon Trotsky were expelled from the Central Committee and forced into exile.In 1928, Stalin introduced the first five-year plan for building a socialist economy. In place of the internationalism expressed by Lenin throughout the Revolution, it aimed to build Socialism in One Country. In industry, the state assumed control over all existing enterprises and undertook an intensive program of industrialization. In agriculture, rather than adhering to the "lead by example" policy advocated by Lenin, forced collectivization of farms was implemented all over the country.Famines ensued as a result, causing deaths estimated at three to seven million; surviving kulaks were persecuted, and many were sent to Gulags to do forced labor. Social upheaval continued in the mid-1930s. Despite the turmoil of the mid-to-late 1930s, the country developed a robust industrial economy in the years preceding World War II.Closer cooperation between the USSR and the West developed in the early 1930s. From 1932 to 1934, the country participated in the World Disarmament Conference. In 1933, diplomatic relations between the United States and the USSR were established when in November, the newly elected President of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, chose to recognize Stalin's Communist government formally and negotiated a new trade agreement between the two countries. In September 1934, the country joined the League of Nations. After the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, the USSR actively supported the Republican forces against the Nationalists, who were supported by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany.In December 1936, Stalin unveiled a new constitution that was praised by supporters around the world as the most democratic constitution imaginable, though there was some skepticism. Stalin's Great Purge resulted in the detainment or execution of many "Old Bolsheviks" who had participated in the October Revolution with Lenin. According to declassified Soviet archives, the NKVD arrested more than one and a half million people in 1937 and 1938, of whom 681,692 were shot. Over those two years, there were an average of over one thousand executions a day.In 1939, after attempts to form a military alliance with Britain and France against Germany failed, the Soviet Union made a dramatic shift towards Nazi Germany. Almost a year after Britain and France had concluded the Munich Agreement with Germany, the Soviet Union made agreements with Germany as well, both militarily and economically during extensive talks. The two countries concluded the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and the German–Soviet Commercial Agreement in August 1939. The former made possible the Soviet occupation of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bessarabia, northern Bukovina, and eastern Poland, while the Soviets remained formally neutral. In late November, unable to coerce the Republic of Finland by diplomatic means into moving its border back from Leningrad, Stalin ordered the invasion of Finland. In the east, the Soviet military won several decisive victories during border clashes with the Empire of Japan in 1938 and 1939. However, in April 1941, the USSR signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact with Japan, recognizing the territorial integrity of Manchukuo, a Japanese puppet state.Germany broke the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 starting what was known in the USSR as the Great Patriotic War. The Red Army stopped the seemingly invincible German Army at the Battle of Moscow. The Battle of Stalingrad, which lasted from late 1942 to early 1943, dealt a severe blow to Germany from which they never fully recovered and became a turning point in the war. After Stalingrad, Soviet forces drove through Eastern Europe to Berlin before Germany surrendered in 1945. The German Army suffered 80% of its military deaths in the Eastern Front. Harry Hopkins, a close foreign policy advisor to Franklin D. Roosevelt, spoke on 10 August 1943 of the USSR's decisive role in the war.In the same year, the USSR, in fulfilment of its agreement with the Allies at the Yalta Conference, denounced the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1945 and invaded Manchukuo and other Japan-controlled territories on 9 August 1945. This conflict ended with a decisive Soviet victory, contributing to the unconditional surrender of Japan and the end of World War II.The USSR suffered greatly in the war, losing around 27 million people. Approximately 2.8 million Soviet POWs died of starvation, mistreatment, or executions in just eight months of 1941–42. During the war, the country together with the United States, the United Kingdom and China were considered the Big Four Allied powers, and later became the Four Policemen that formed the basis of the United Nations Security Council. It emerged as a superpower in the post-war period. Once denied diplomatic recognition by the Western world, the USSR had official relations with practically every country by the late 1940s. A member of the United Nations at its foundation in 1945, the country became one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, which gave it the right to veto any of its resolutions.During the immediate post-war period, the Soviet Union rebuilt and expanded its economy, while maintaining its strictly centralized control. It took effective control over most of the countries of Eastern Europe (except Yugoslavia and later Albania), turning them into satellite states. The USSR bound its satellite states in a military alliance, the Warsaw Pact, in 1955, and an economic organization, Council for Mutual Economic Assistance or Comecon, a counterpart to the European Economic Community (EEC), from 1949 to 1991. The USSR concentrated on its own recovery, seizing and transferring most of Germany's industrial plants, and it exacted war reparations from East Germany, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria using Soviet-dominated joint enterprises. It also instituted trading arrangements deliberately designed to favor the country. Moscow controlled the Communist parties that ruled the satellite states, and they followed orders from the Kremlin. Later, the Comecon supplied aid to the eventually victorious Communist Party of China, and its influence grew elsewhere in the world. Fearing its ambitions, the Soviet Union's wartime allies, the United Kingdom and the United States, became its enemies. In the ensuing Cold War, the two sides clashed indirectly in proxy wars.Stalin died on 5 March 1953. Without a mutually agreeable successor, the highest Communist Party officials initially opted to rule the Soviet Union jointly through a troika headed by Georgy Malenkov. This did not last, however, and Nikita Khrushchev eventually won the ensuing power struggle by the mid-1950s. In 1956, he denounced Joseph Stalin and proceeded to ease controls over the party and society. This was known as de-Stalinization.Moscow considered Eastern Europe to be a critically vital buffer zone for the forward defence of its western borders, in case of another major invasion such as the German invasion of 1941. For this reason, the USSR sought to cement its control of the region by transforming the Eastern European countries into satellite states, dependent upon and subservient to its leadership. As a result, Soviet military forces were used to suppress an anti-communist uprising in Hungary in 1956.In the late 1950s, a confrontation with China regarding the Soviet rapprochement with the West, and what Mao Zedong perceived as Khrushchev's revisionism, led to the Sino–Soviet split. This resulted in a break throughout the global Marxist–Leninist movement, with the governments in Albania, Cambodia and Somalia choosing to ally with China.During this period of the late 1950s and early 1960s, the USSR continued to realize scientific and technological exploits in the Space Race, rivaling the United States: launching the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1 in 1957; a living dog named Laika in 1957; the first human being, Yuri Gagarin in 1961; the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova in 1963; Alexei Leonov, the first person to walk in space in 1965; the first soft landing on the Moon by spacecraft Luna 9 in 1966; and the first Moon rovers, Lunokhod 1 and Lunokhod 2.Khrushchev initiated "The Thaw", a complex shift in political, cultural and economic life in the country. This included some openness and contact with other nations and new social and economic policies with more emphasis on commodity goods, allowing a dramatic rise in living standards while maintaining high levels of economic growth. Censorship was relaxed as well. Khrushchev's reforms in agriculture and administration, however, were generally unproductive. In 1962, he precipitated a crisis with the United States over the Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles in Cuba. An agreement was made with the United States to remove nuclear missiles from both Cuba and Turkey, concluding the crisis. This event caused Khrushchev much embarrassment and loss of prestige, resulting in his removal from power in 1964.Following the ousting of Khrushchev, another period of collective leadership ensued, consisting of Leonid Brezhnev as General Secretary, Alexei Kosygin as Premier and Nikolai Podgorny as Chairman of the Presidium, lasting until Brezhnev established himself in the early 1970s as the preeminent Soviet leader.In 1968, the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact allies invaded Czechoslovakia to halt the Prague Spring reforms. In the aftermath, Brezhnev justified the invasion and previous military interventions as well as any potential military interventions in the future by introducing the Brezhnev Doctrine, which proclaimed any threat to socialist rule in a Warsaw Pact state as a threat to all Warsaw Pact states, therefore justifying military intervention.Brezhnev presided throughout "détente" with the West that resulted in treaties on armament control (SALT I, SALT II, Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty) while at the same time building up Soviet military might.In October 1977, the third Soviet Constitution was unanimously adopted. The prevailing mood of the Soviet leadership at the time of Brezhnev's death in 1982 was one of aversion to change. The long period of Brezhnev's rule had come to be dubbed one of "standstill", with an ageing and ossified top political leadership. This period is also known as the Era of Stagnation, a period of adverse economic, political, and social effects in the country, which began during the rule of Brezhnev and continued under his successors Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko.In late 1979, the Soviet Union's military intervened in the ongoing civil war in neighboring Afghanistan, effectively ending a détente with the West.Two developments dominated the decade that followed: the increasingly apparent crumbling of the Soviet Union's economic and political structures, and the patchwork attempts at reforms to reverse that process. Kenneth S. Deffeyes argued in "Beyond Oil" that the Reagan administration encouraged Saudi Arabia to lower the price of oil to the point where the Soviets could not make a profit selling their oil, and resulted in the depletion of the country's hard currency reserves.Brezhnev's next two successors, transitional figures with deep roots in his tradition, did not last long. Yuri Andropov was 68 years old and Konstantin Chernenko 72 when they assumed power; both died in less than two years. In an attempt to avoid a third short-lived leader, in 1985, the Soviets turned to the next generation and selected Mikhail Gorbachev. He made significant changes in the economy and party leadership, called "perestroika". His policy of "glasnost" freed public access to information after decades of heavy government censorship. Gorbachev also moved to end the Cold War. In 1988, the USSR abandoned its war in Afghanistan and began to withdraw its forces. In the following year, Gorbachev refused to interfere in the internal affairs of the Soviet satellite states, which paved the way for the Revolutions of 1989. In particular, the standstill of the Soviet Union at the Pan-European Picnic in August 1989 then set a peaceful chain reaction in motion at the end of which the Eastern Bloc collapsed. With the tearing down of the Berlin Wall and with East and West Germany pursuing unification, the Iron Curtain between the West and Soviet-controlled regions came down.At the same time, the Soviet republics started legal moves towards potentially declaring sovereignty over their territories, citing the freedom to secede in Article 72 of the USSR constitution. On 7 April 1990, a law was passed allowing a republic to secede if more than two-thirds of its residents voted for it in a referendum. Many held their first free elections in the Soviet era for their own national legislatures in 1990. Many of these legislatures proceeded to produce legislation contradicting the Union laws in what was known as the "War of Laws". In 1989, the Russian SFSR convened a newly elected Congress of People's Deputies. Boris Yeltsin was elected its chairman. On 12 June 1990, the Congress declared Russia's sovereignty over its territory and proceeded to pass laws that attempted to supersede some of the Soviet laws. After a landslide victory of Sąjūdis in Lithuania, that country declared its independence restored on 11 March 1990.A referendum for the preservation of the USSR was held on 17 March 1991 in nine republics (the remainder having boycotted the vote), with the majority of the population in those republics voting for preservation of the Union. The referendum gave Gorbachev a minor boost. In the summer of 1991, the New Union Treaty, which would have turned the country into a much looser Union, was agreed upon by eight republics. The signing of the treaty, however, was interrupted by the August Coup—an attempted coup d'état by hardline members of the government and the KGB who sought to reverse Gorbachev's reforms and reassert the central government's control over the republics. After the coup collapsed, Yeltsin was seen as a hero for his decisive actions, while Gorbachev's power was effectively ended. The balance of power tipped significantly towards the republics. In August 1991, Latvia and Estonia immediately declared the restoration of their full independence (following Lithuania's 1990 example). Gorbachev resigned as general secretary in late August, and soon afterwards, the party's activities were indefinitely suspended—effectively ending its rule. By the fall, Gorbachev could no longer influence events outside Moscow, and he was being challenged even there by Yeltsin, who had been elected President of Russia in July 1991.The remaining 12 republics continued discussing new, increasingly looser, models of the Union. However, by December all except Russia and Kazakhstan had formally declared independence. During this time, Yeltsin took over what remained of the Soviet government, including the Moscow Kremlin. The final blow was struck on 1 December when Ukraine, the second-most powerful republic, voted overwhelmingly for independence. Ukraine's secession ended any realistic chance of the country staying together even on a limited scale.On 8 December 1991, the presidents of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus (formerly Byelorussia), signed the Belavezha Accords, which declared the Soviet Union dissolved and established the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in its place. While doubts remained over the authority of the accords to do this, on 21 December 1991, the representatives of all Soviet republics except Georgia signed the Alma-Ata Protocol, which confirmed the accords. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned as the President of the USSR, declaring the office extinct. He turned the powers that had been vested in the presidency over to Yeltsin. That night, the Soviet flag was lowered for the last time, and the Russian tricolor was raised in its place.The following day, the Supreme Soviet, the highest governmental body, voted both itself and the country out of existence. This is generally recognized as marking the official, final dissolution of the Soviet Union as a functioning state, and the end of the Cold War. The Soviet Army initially remained under overall CIS command but was soon absorbed into the different military forces of the newly independent states. The few remaining Soviet institutions that had not been taken over by Russia ceased to function by the end of 1991.Following the dissolution, Russia was internationally recognized as its legal successor on the international stage. To that end, Russia voluntarily accepted all Soviet foreign debt and claimed Soviet overseas properties as its own. Under the 1992 Lisbon Protocol, Russia also agreed to receive all nuclear weapons remaining in the territory of other former Soviet republics. Since then, the Russian Federation has assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations. Ukraine has refused to recognize exclusive Russian claims to succession of the USSR and claimed such status for Ukraine as well, which was codified in Articles 7 and 8 of its 1991 law On Legal Succession of Ukraine. Since its independence in 1991, Ukraine has continued to pursue claims against Russia in foreign courts, seeking to recover its share of the foreign property that was owned by the USSR.The dissolution was followed by a severe drop in economic and social conditions in post-Soviet states, including a rapid increase in poverty, crime, corruption, unemployment, homelessness, rates of disease, infant mortality and domestic violence, as well as demographic losses and income inequality and the rise of an oligarchical class, along with decreases in calorie intake, life expectancy, adult literacy, and income. Between 1988–1989 and 1993–1995, the Gini ratio increased by an average of 9 points for all former socialist countries. The economic shocks that accompanied wholesale privatization were associated with sharp increases in mortality. Data shows Russia, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia saw a tripling of unemployment and a 42% increase in male death rates between 1991 and 1994. In the following decades, only five or six of the post-communist states are on a path to joining the wealthy capitalist West while most are falling behind, some to such an extent that it will take over fifty years to catch up to where they were before the fall of the Soviet Bloc.In summing up the international ramifications of these events, Vladislav Zubok stated: "The collapse of the Soviet empire was an event of epochal geopolitical, military, ideological, and economic significance." Before the dissolution, the country had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, military strength, economic strength, aid to developing countries, and scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The analysis of the succession of states for the 15 post-Soviet states is complex. The Russian Federation is seen as the legal "continuator" state and is for most purposes the heir to the Soviet Union. It retained ownership of all former Soviet embassy properties, as well as the old Soviet UN membership and permanent membership on the Security Council.Of the two other co-founding states of the USSR at the time of the dissolution, Ukraine was the only one that had passed laws, similar to Russia, that it is a state-successor of both the Ukrainian SSR and the USSR. Soviet treaties laid groundwork for Ukraine's future foreign agreements as well as they led to Ukraine agreeing to undertake 16.37% of debts of the Soviet Union for which it was going to receive its share of USSR's foreign property. Although it had a tough position at the time, due to Russia's position as a "single continuation of the USSR" that became widely accepted in the West as well as a constant pressure from the Western countries, allowed Russia to dispose state property of USSR abroad and conceal information about it. Due to that Ukraine never ratified "zero option" agreement that Russian Federation had signed with other former Soviet republics, as it denied disclosing of information about Soviet Gold Reserves and its Diamond Fund. The dispute over former Soviet property and assets between the two former republics is still ongoing:Similar situation occurred with restitution of cultural property. Although on 14 February 1992 Russia and other former Soviet republics signed agreement "On the return of cultural and historic property to the origin states" in Minsk, it was halted by Russian State Duma that had eventually passed "Federal Law on Cultural Valuables Displaced to the USSR as a Result of the Second World War and Located on the Territory of the Russian Federation" which made restitution currently impossible.There are additionally four states that claim independence from the other internationally recognised post-Soviet states but possess limited international recognition: Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia and Transnistria. The Chechen separatist movement of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria lacks any international recognition.During his rule, Stalin always made the final policy decisions. Otherwise, Soviet foreign policy was set by the commission on the Foreign Policy of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, or by the party's highest body the Politburo. Operations were handled by the separate Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It was known as the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (or Narkomindel), until 1946. The most influential spokesmen were Georgy Chicherin (1872–1936), Maxim Litvinov (1876–1951), Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986), Andrey Vyshinsky (1883–1954) and Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989). Intellectuals were based in the Moscow State Institute of International Relations.The Marxist-Leninist leadership of the Soviet Union intensely debated foreign policy issues and change directions several times. Even after Stalin assumed dictatorial control in the late 1920s, there were debates, and he frequently changed positions.During the country's early period, it was assumed that Communist revolutions would break out soon in every major industrial country, and it was the Soviet responsibility to assist them. The Comintern was the weapon of choice. A few revolutions did break out, but they were quickly suppressed (the longest lasting one was in Hungary)—the Hungarian Soviet Republic—lasted only from 21 March 1919 to 1 August 1919. The Russian Bolsheviks were in no position to give any help.By 1921, Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin realized that capitalism had stabilized itself in Europe and there would not be any widespread revolutions anytime soon. It became the duty of the Russian Bolsheviks to protect what they had in Russia, and avoid military confrontations that might destroy their bridgehead. Russia was now a pariah state, along with Germany. The two came to terms in 1922 with the Treaty of Rapallo that settled long-standing grievances. At the same time, the two countries secretly set up training programs for the illegal German army and air force operations at hidden camps in the USSR.Moscow eventually stopped threatening other states, and instead worked to open peaceful relationships in terms of trade, and diplomatic recognition. The United Kingdom dismissed the warnings of Winston Churchill and a few others about a continuing Marxist-Leninist threat, and opened trade relations and "de facto" diplomatic recognition in 1922. There was hope for a settlement of the pre-war Tsarist debts, but it was repeatedly postponed. Formal recognition came when the new Labour Party came to power in 1924. All the other countries followed suit in opening trade relations. Henry Ford opened large-scale business relations with the Soviets in the late 1920s, hoping that it would lead to long-term peace. Finally, in 1933, the United States officially recognized the USSR, a decision backed by the public opinion and especially by US business interests that expected an opening of a new profitable market.In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Stalin ordered Marxist-Leninist parties across the world to strongly oppose non-Marxist political parties, labor unions or other organizations on the left. Stalin reversed himself in 1934 with the Popular Front program that called on all Marxist parties to join together with all anti-Fascist political, labor, and organizational forces that were opposed to fascism, especially of the Nazi variety.In 1939, half a year after the Munich Agreement, the USSR attempted to form an anti-Nazi alliance with France and Britain. Adolf Hitler proposed a better deal, which would give the USSR control over much of Eastern Europe through the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In September, Germany invaded Poland, and the USSR also invaded later that month, resulting in the partition of Poland. In response, Britain and France declared war on Germany, marking the beginning of World War II.There were three power hierarchies in the Soviet Union: the legislature represented by the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, the government represented by the Council of Ministers, and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), the only legal party and the final policymaker in the country.At the top of the Communist Party was the Central Committee, elected at Party Congresses and Conferences. In turn, the Central Committee voted for a Politburo (called the Presidium between 1952 and 1966), Secretariat and the General Secretary (First Secretary from 1953 to 1966), the "de facto" highest office in the Soviet Union. Depending on the degree of power consolidation, it was either the Politburo as a collective body or the General Secretary, who always was one of the Politburo members, that effectively led the party and the country (except for the period of the highly personalized authority of Stalin, exercised directly through his position in the Council of Ministers rather than the Politburo after 1941). They were not controlled by the general party membership, as the key principle of the party organization was democratic centralism, demanding strict subordination to higher bodies, and elections went uncontested, endorsing the candidates proposed from above.The Communist Party maintained its dominance over the state mainly through its control over the system of appointments. All senior government officials and most deputies of the Supreme Soviet were members of the CPSU. Of the party heads themselves, Stalin (1941–1953) and Khrushchev (1958–1964) were Premiers. Upon the forced retirement of Khrushchev, the party leader was prohibited from this kind of double membership, but the later General Secretaries for at least some part of their tenure occupied the mostly ceremonial position of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, the nominal head of state. The institutions at lower levels were overseen and at times supplanted by primary party organizations.However, in practice the degree of control the party was able to exercise over the state bureaucracy, particularly after the death of Stalin, was far from total, with the bureaucracy pursuing different interests that were at times in conflict with the party. Nor was the party itself monolithic from top to bottom, although factions were officially banned.The Supreme Soviet (successor of the Congress of Soviets) was nominally the highest state body for most of the Soviet history, at first acting as a rubber stamp institution, approving and implementing all decisions made by the party. However, its powers and functions were extended in the late 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, including the creation of new state commissions and committees. It gained additional powers relating to the approval of the Five-Year Plans and the government budget. The Supreme Soviet elected a Presidium (successor of the Central Executive Committee) to wield its power between plenary sessions, ordinarily held twice a year, and appointed the Supreme Court, the Procurator General and the Council of Ministers (known before 1946 as the Council of People's Commissars), headed by the Chairman (Premier) and managing an enormous bureaucracy responsible for the administration of the economy and society. State and party structures of the constituent republics largely emulated the structure of the central institutions, although the Russian SFSR, unlike the other constituent republics, for most of its history had no republican branch of the CPSU, being ruled directly by the union-wide party until 1990. Local authorities were organized likewise into party committees, local Soviets and executive committees. While the state system was nominally federal, the party was unitary.The state security police (the KGB and ) played an important role in Soviet politics. It was instrumental in the Great Purge, but was brought under strict party control after Stalin's death. Under Yuri Andropov, the KGB engaged in the suppression of political dissent and maintained an extensive network of informers, reasserting itself as a political actor to some extent independent of the party-state structure, culminating in the anti-corruption campaign targeting high-ranking party officials in the late 1970s and early 1980s.The constitution, which was promulgated in 1924, 1936 and 1977, did not limit state power. No formal separation of powers existed between the Party, Supreme Soviet and Council of Ministers that represented executive and legislative branches of the government. The system was governed less by statute than by informal conventions, and no settled mechanism of leadership succession existed. Bitter and at times deadly power struggles took place in the Politburo after the deaths of Lenin and Stalin, as well as after Khrushchev's dismissal, itself due to a decision by both the Politburo and the Central Committee. All leaders of the Communist Party before Gorbachev died in office, except Georgy Malenkov and Khrushchev, both dismissed from the party leadership amid internal struggle within the party.Between 1988 and 1990, facing considerable opposition, Mikhail Gorbachev enacted reforms shifting power away from the highest bodies of the party and making the Supreme Soviet less dependent on them. The Congress of People's Deputies was established, the majority of whose members were directly elected in competitive elections held in March 1989. The Congress now elected the Supreme Soviet, which became a full-time parliament, and much stronger than before. For the first time since the 1920s, it refused to rubber stamp proposals from the party and Council of Ministers. In 1990, Gorbachev introduced and assumed the position of the President of the Soviet Union, concentrated power in his executive office, independent of the party, and subordinated the government, now renamed the Cabinet of Ministers of the USSR, to himself.Tensions grew between the Union-wide authorities under Gorbachev, reformists led in Russia by Boris Yeltsin and controlling the newly elected Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR, and communist hardliners. On 19–21 August 1991, a group of hardliners staged a coup attempt. The coup failed, and the State Council of the Soviet Union became the highest organ of state power "in the period of transition". Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary, only remaining President for the final months of the existence of the USSR.The judiciary was not independent of the other branches of government. The Supreme Court supervised the lower courts (People's Court) and applied the law as established by the constitution or as interpreted by the Supreme Soviet. The Constitutional Oversight Committee reviewed the constitutionality of laws and acts. The Soviet Union used the inquisitorial system of Roman law, where the judge, procurator, and defence attorney collaborate to establish the truth.Constitutionally, the USSR was a federation of constituent Union Republics, which were either unitary states, such as Ukraine or Byelorussia (SSRs), or federations, such as Russia or Transcaucasia (SFSRs), all four being the founding republics who signed the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR in December 1922. In 1924, during the national delimitation in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were formed from parts of Russia's Turkestan ASSR and two Soviet dependencies, the Khorezm and Bukharan SSRs. In 1929, Tajikistan was split off from the Uzbekistan SSR. With the constitution of 1936, the Transcaucasian SFSR was dissolved, resulting in its constituent republics of Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan being elevated to Union Republics, while Kazakhstan and Kirghizia were split off from Russian SFSR, resulting in the same status. In August 1940, Moldavia was formed from parts of Ukraine and Bessarabia and northern Bukovina. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (SSRs) were also admitted into the union which was not recognized by most of the international community and was considered an illegal occupation. Karelia was split off from Russia as a Union Republic in March 1940 and was reabsorbed in 1956. Between July 1956 and September 1991, there were 15 union republics (see map below).While nominally a union of equals, in practice the Soviet Union was dominated by Russians. The domination was so absolute that for most of its existence, the country was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to as "Russia". While the RSFSR was technically only one republic within the larger union, it was by far the largest (both in terms of population and area), most powerful, most developed, and the industrial center of the Soviet Union. Historian Matthew White wrote that it was an open secret that the country's federal structure was "window dressing" for Russian dominance. For that reason, the people of the USSR were usually called "Russians", not "Soviets", since "everyone knew who really ran the show".Under the Military Law of September 1925, the Soviet Armed Forces consisted of the Land Forces, the Air Force, the Navy, Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU), and the Internal Troops. The OGPU later became independent and in 1934 joined the NKVD, and so its internal troops were under the joint leadership of the defense and internal commissariats. After World War II, Strategic Missile Forces (1959), Air Defense Forces (1948) and National Civil Defense Forces (1970) were formed, which ranked first, third, and sixth in the official Soviet system of importance (ground forces were second, Air Force Fourth, and Navy Fifth).The army had the greatest political influence. In 1989, there served two million soldiers divided between 150 motorized and 52 armored divisions. Until the early 1960s, the Soviet navy was a rather small military branch, but after the Caribbean crisis, under the leadership of Sergei Gorshkov, it expanded significantly. It became known for battlecruisers and submarines. In 1989 there served 500 000 men. The Soviet Air Force focused on a fleet of strategic bombers and during war situation was to eradicate enemy infrastructure and nuclear capacity. The air force also had a number of fighters and tactical bombers to support the army in the war. Strategic missile forces had more than 1,400 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), deployed between 28 bases and 300 command centers.In the post-war period, the Soviet Army was directly involved in several military operations abroad. These included the suppression of the uprising in East Germany (1953), Hungarian revolution (1956) and the invasion of Czechoslovakia (1968). The Soviet Union also participated in the war in Afghanistan between 1979 and 1989.In the Soviet Union, general conscription applied.At the end of the 1950s, with the help of engineers and technologies captured and imported from defeated Nazi Germany, the Soviets constructed the first satellite – Sputnik 1 and thus overtook the United States in terms of utilizing space. This was followed by other successful satellites, where test dogs flight was sent. On April 12, 1961, the first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, was sent to the space. He once flew around the Earth and successfully landed in the Kazakh steppe. At that time, the first plans for space shuttles and orbital stations were drawn up in Soviet design offices, but in the end personal disputes between designers and management prevented this.As for Lunar space program; USSR only had a program on automated spacecraft launches; with no manned spacecraft used; passing on the "Moon Race" part of Space Race.In the 1970s, specific proposals for the design of the space shuttle began to emerge, but shortcomings, especially in the electronics industry (rapid overheating of electronics), postponed the program until the end of the 1980s. The first shuttle, the Buran, flew in 1988, but without a human crew. Another shuttle, "Ptichka", eventually ended up under construction, as the shuttle project was canceled in 1991. For their launch into space, there is today an unused superpower rocket, Energia, which is the most powerful in the world.In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union managed to build the "Mir" orbital station. It was built on the construction of "Salyut" stations and its only role was civilian-grade research tasks. The Soviet Union adopted a command economy, whereby production and distribution of goods were centralized and directed by the government. The first Bolshevik experience with a command economy was the policy of War communism, which involved the nationalization of industry, centralized distribution of output, coercive requisition of agricultural production, and attempts to eliminate money circulation, private enterprises and free trade. After the severe economic collapse, Lenin replaced war communism by the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1921, legalizing free trade and private ownership of small businesses. The economy quickly recovered as a result.After a long debate among the members of the Politburo about the course of economic development, by 1928–1929, upon gaining control of the country, Stalin abandoned the NEP and pushed for full central planning, starting forced collectivization of agriculture and enacting draconian labor legislation. Resources were mobilized for rapid industrialization, which significantly expanded Soviet capacity in heavy industry and capital goods during the 1930s. The primary motivation for industrialization was preparation for war, mostly due to distrust of the outside capitalist world. As a result, the USSR was transformed from a largely agrarian economy into a great industrial power, leading the way for its emergence as a superpower after World War II. The war caused extensive devastation of the Soviet economy and infrastructure, which required massive reconstruction.By the early 1940s, the Soviet economy had become relatively self-sufficient; for most of the period until the creation of Comecon, only a tiny share of domestic products was traded internationally. After the creation of the Eastern Bloc, external trade rose rapidly. However, the influence of the world economy on the USSR was limited by fixed domestic prices and a state monopoly on foreign trade. Grain and sophisticated consumer manufactures became major import articles from around the 1960s. During the arms race of the Cold War, the Soviet economy was burdened by military expenditures, heavily lobbied for by a powerful bureaucracy dependent on the arms industry. At the same time, the USSR became the largest arms exporter to the Third World. Significant amounts of Soviet resources during the Cold War were allocated in aid to the other socialist states.From the 1930s until its dissolution in late 1991, the way the Soviet economy operated remained essentially unchanged. The economy was formally directed by central planning, carried out by Gosplan and organized in five-year plans. However, in practice, the plans were highly aggregated and provisional, subject to "ad hoc" intervention by superiors. All critical economic decisions were taken by the political leadership. Allocated resources and plan targets were usually denominated in rubles rather than in physical goods. Credit was discouraged, but widespread. The final allocation of output was achieved through relatively decentralized, unplanned contracting. Although in theory prices were legally set from above, in practice they were often negotiated, and informal horizontal links (e.g. between producer factories) were widespread.A number of basic services were state-funded, such as education and health care. In the manufacturing sector, heavy industry and defence were prioritized over consumer goods. Consumer goods, particularly outside large cities, were often scarce, of poor quality and limited variety. Under the command economy, consumers had almost no influence on production, and the changing demands of a population with growing incomes could not be satisfied by supplies at rigidly fixed prices. A massive unplanned second economy grew up at low levels alongside the planned one, providing some of the goods and services that the planners could not. The legalization of some elements of the decentralized economy was attempted with the reform of 1965.Although statistics of the Soviet economy are notoriously unreliable and its economic growth difficult to estimate precisely, by most accounts, the economy continued to expand until the mid-1980s. During the 1950s and 1960s, it had comparatively high growth and was catching up to the West. However, after 1970, the growth, while still positive, steadily declined much more quickly and consistently than in other countries, despite a rapid increase in the capital stock (the rate of capital increase was only surpassed by Japan).Overall, the growth rate of per capita income in the Soviet Union between 1960 and 1989 was slightly above the world average (based on 102 countries). According to Stanley Fischer and William Easterly, growth could have been faster. By their calculation, per capita income in 1989 should have been twice higher than it was, considering the amount of investment, education and population. The authors attribute this poor performance to the low productivity of capital. Steven Rosenfielde states that the standard of living declined due to Stalin's despotism. While there was a brief improvement after his death, it lapsed into stagnation.In 1987, Mikhail Gorbachev attempted to reform and revitalize the economy with his program of "perestroika". His policies relaxed state control over enterprises but did not replace it by market incentives, resulting in a sharp decline in output. The economy, already suffering from reduced petroleum export revenues, started to collapse. Prices were still fixed, and the property was still largely state-owned until after the country's dissolution. For most of the period after World War II until its collapse, Soviet GDP (PPP) was the second-largest in the world, and third during the second half of the 1980s, although on a per-capita basis, it was behind that of First World countries. Compared to countries with similar per-capita GDP in 1928, the Soviet Union experienced significant growth.In 1990, the country had a Human Development Index of 0.920, placing it in the "high" category of human development. It was the third-highest in the Eastern Bloc, behind Czechoslovakia and East Germany, and the 25th in the world of 130 countries.The need for fuel declined in the Soviet Union from the 1970s to the 1980s, both per ruble of gross social product and per ruble of industrial product. At the start, this decline grew very rapidly but gradually slowed down between 1970 and 1975. From 1975 and 1980, it grew even slower, only 2.6%. David Wilson, a historian, believed that the gas industry would account for 40% of Soviet fuel production by the end of the century. His theory did not come to fruition because of the USSR's collapse. The USSR, in theory, would have continued to have an economic growth rate of 2–2.5% during the 1990s because of Soviet energy fields. However, the energy sector faced many difficulties, among them the country's high military expenditure and hostile relations with the First World.In 1991, the Soviet Union had a pipeline network of for crude oil and another for natural gas. Petroleum and petroleum-based products, natural gas, metals, wood, agricultural products, and a variety of manufactured goods, primarily machinery, arms and military equipment, were exported. In the 1970s and 1980s, the USSR heavily relied on fossil fuel exports to earn hard currency. At its peak in 1988, it was the largest producer and second-largest exporter of crude oil, surpassed only by Saudi Arabia.The Soviet Union placed great emphasis on science and technology within its economy, however, the most remarkable Soviet successes in technology, such as producing the world's first space satellite, typically were the responsibility of the military. Lenin believed that the USSR would never overtake the developed world if it remained as technologically backward as it was upon its founding. Soviet authorities proved their commitment to Lenin's belief by developing massive networks, research and development organizations. In the early 1960s, the Soviets awarded 40% of chemistry PhDs to women, compared to only 5% in the United States. By 1989, Soviet scientists were among the world's best-trained specialists in several areas, such as energy physics, selected areas of medicine, mathematics, welding and military technologies. Due to rigid state planning and bureaucracy, the Soviets remained far behind technologically in chemistry, biology, and computers when compared to the First World.Under the Reagan administration, Project Socrates determined that the Soviet Union addressed the acquisition of science and technology in a manner that was radically different from what the US was using. In the case of the US, economic prioritization was being used for indigenous research and development as the means to acquire science and technology in both the private and public sectors. In contrast, the USSR was offensively and defensively maneuvering in the acquisition and utilization of the worldwide technology, to increase the competitive advantage that they acquired from the technology while preventing the US from acquiring a competitive advantage. However, technology-based planning was executed in a centralized, government-centric manner that greatly hindered its flexibility. This was exploited by the US to undermine the strength of the Soviet Union and thus foster its reform.Transport was a vital component of the country's economy. The economic centralization of the late 1920s and 1930s led to the development of infrastructure on a massive scale, most notably the establishment of Aeroflot, an aviation enterprise. The country had a wide variety of modes of transport by land, water and air. However, due to inadequate maintenance, much of the road, water and Soviet civil aviation transport were outdated and technologically backward compared to the First World.Soviet rail transport was the largest and most intensively used in the world; it was also better developed than most of its Western counterparts. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, Soviet economists were calling for the construction of more roads to alleviate some of the burdens from the railways and to improve the Soviet government budget. The street network and automotive industry remained underdeveloped, and dirt roads were common outside major cities. Soviet maintenance projects proved unable to take care of even the few roads the country had. By the early-to-mid-1980s, the Soviet authorities tried to solve the road problem by ordering the construction of new ones. Meanwhile, the automobile industry was growing at a faster rate than road construction. The underdeveloped road network led to a growing demand for public transport.Despite improvements, several aspects of the transport sector were still riddled with problems due to outdated infrastructure, lack of investment, corruption and bad decision-making. Soviet authorities were unable to meet the growing demand for transport infrastructure and services.The Soviet merchant navy was one of the largest in the world.Excess deaths throughout World War I and the Russian Civil War (including the postwar famine) amounted to a combined total of 18 million, some 10 million in the 1930s, and more than 26 million in 1941–5. The postwar Soviet population was 45 to 50 million smaller than it would have been if pre-war demographic growth had continued. According to Catherine Merridale, "... reasonable estimate would place the total number of excess deaths for the whole period somewhere around 60 million."The birth rate of the USSR decreased from 44.0 per thousand in 1926 to 18.0 in 1974, mainly due to increasing urbanization and the rising average age of marriages. The mortality rate demonstrated a gradual decrease as well – from 23.7 per thousand in 1926 to 8.7 in 1974. In general, the birth rates of the southern republics in Transcaucasia and Central Asia were considerably higher than those in the northern parts of the Soviet Union, and in some cases even increased in the post–World War II period, a phenomenon partly attributed to slower rates of urbanistion and traditionally earlier marriages in the southern republics. Soviet Europe moved towards sub-replacement fertility, while Soviet Central Asia continued to exhibit population growth well above replacement-level fertility.The late 1960s and the 1970s witnessed a reversal of the declining trajectory of the rate of mortality in the USSR, and was especially notable among men of working age, but was also prevalent in Russia and other predominantly Slavic areas of the country. An analysis of the official data from the late 1980s showed that after worsening in the late-1970s and the early 1980s, adult mortality began to improve again. The infant mortality rate increased from 24.7 in 1970 to 27.9 in 1974. Some researchers regarded the rise as mostly real, a consequence of worsening health conditions and services. The rises in both adult and infant mortality were not explained or defended by Soviet officials, and the Soviet government stopped publishing all mortality statistics for ten years. Soviet demographers and health specialists remained silent about the mortality increases until the late-1980s, when the publication of mortality data resumed, and researchers could delve into the real causes.Under Lenin, the state made explicit commitments to promote the equality of men and women. Many early Russian feminists and ordinary Russian working women actively participated in the Revolution, and many more were affected by the events of that period and the new policies. Beginning in October 1918, Lenin's government liberalized divorce and abortion laws, decriminalized homosexuality (re-criminalized in the 1930s), permitted cohabitation, and ushered in a host of reforms. However, without birth control, the new system produced many broken marriages, as well as countless out-of-wedlock children. The epidemic of divorces and extramarital affairs created social hardships when Soviet leaders wanted people to concentrate their efforts on growing the economy. Giving women control over their fertility also led to a precipitous decline in the birth rate, perceived as a threat to their country's military power. By 1936, Stalin reversed most of the liberal laws, ushering in a pronatalist era that lasted for decades.By 1917, Russia became the first great power to grant women the right to vote. After heavy casualties in World War I and II, women outnumbered men in Russia by a 4:3 ratio. This contributed to the larger role women played in Russian society compared to other great powers at the time.Anatoly Lunacharsky became the first People's Commissar for Education of Soviet Russia. In the beginning, the Soviet authorities placed great emphasis on the elimination of illiteracy. All left-handed children were forced to write with their right hand in the Soviet school system. Literate people were automatically hired as teachers. For a short period, quality was sacrificed for quantity. By 1940, Stalin could announce that illiteracy had been eliminated. Throughout the 1930s, social mobility rose sharply, which has been attributed to reforms in education. In the aftermath of World War II, the country's educational system expanded dramatically, which had a tremendous effect. In the 1960s, nearly all children had access to education, the only exception being those living in remote areas. Nikita Khrushchev tried to make education more accessible, making it clear to children that education was closely linked to the needs of society. Education also became important in giving rise to the New Man. Citizens directly entering the workforce had the constitutional right to a job and to free vocational training.The education system was highly centralized and universally accessible to all citizens, with affirmative action for applicants from nations associated with cultural backwardness. However, as part of the general antisemitic policy, an unofficial Jewish quota was applied in the leading institutions of higher education by subjecting Jewish applicants to harsher entrance examinations. The Brezhnev era also introduced a rule that required all university applicants to present a reference from the local Komsomol party secretary. According to statistics from 1986, the number of higher education students per the population of 10,000 was 181 for the USSR, compared to 517 for the US.The Soviet Union was an ethnically diverse country, with more than 100 distinct ethnic groups. The total population of the country was estimated at 293 million in 1991. According to a 1990 estimate, the majority of the population were Russians (50.78%), followed by Ukrainians (15.45%) and Uzbeks (5.84%).All citizens of the USSR had their own ethnic affiliation. The ethnicity of a person was chosen at the age of sixteen by the child's parents. If the parents did not agree, the child was automatically assigned the ethnicity of the father. Partly due to Soviet policies, some of the smaller minority ethnic groups were considered part of larger ones, such as the Mingrelians of Georgia, who were classified with the linguistically related Georgians. Some ethnic groups voluntarily assimilated, while others were brought in by force. Russians, Belarusians, and Ukrainians, who were all East Slavic and Orthodox, shared close cultural, ethnic, and religious ties, while other groups did not. With multiple nationalities living in the same territory, ethnic antagonisms developed over the years.Members of various ethnicities participated in legislative bodies. Organs of power like the Politburo, the Secretariat of the Central Committee etc., were formally ethnically neutral, but in reality, ethnic Russians were overrepresented, although there were also non-Russian leaders in the Soviet leadership, such as Joseph Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev, Nikolai Podgorny or Andrei Gromyko. During the Soviet era, a significant number of ethnic Russians and Ukrainians migrated to other Soviet republics, and many of them settled there. According to the last census in 1989, the Russian "diaspora" in the Soviet republics had reached 25 million.In 1917, before the revolution, health conditions were significantly behind those of developed countries. As Lenin later noted, "Either the lice will defeat socialism, or socialism will defeat the lice". The Soviet principle of health care was conceived by the People's Commissariat for Health in 1918. Health care was to be controlled by the state and would be provided to its citizens free of charge, a revolutionary concept at the time. Article 42 of the 1977 Soviet Constitution gave all citizens the right to health protection and free access to any health institutions in the USSR. Before Leonid Brezhnev became General Secretary, the Soviet healthcare system was held in high esteem by many foreign specialists. This changed, however, from Brezhnev's accession and Mikhail Gorbachev's tenure as leader, during which the health care system was heavily criticized for many basic faults, such as the quality of service and the unevenness in its provision. Minister of Health Yevgeniy Chazov, during the 19th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, while highlighting such successes as having the most doctors and hospitals in the world, recognized the system's areas for improvement and felt that billions of Soviet rubles were squandered. After the revolution, life expectancy for all age groups went up. This statistic in itself was seen by some that the socialist system was superior to the capitalist system. These improvements continued into the 1960s when statistics indicated that the life expectancy briefly surpassed that of the United States. Life expectancy started to decline in the 1970s, possibly because of alcohol abuse. At the same time, infant mortality began to rise. After 1974, the government stopped publishing statistics on the matter. This trend can be partly explained by the number of pregnancies rising drastically in the Asian part of the country where infant mortality was the highest while declining markedly in the more developed European part of the Soviet Union.Soviet dental technology and dental health were considered notoriously bad. In 1991, the average 35-year-old had 12 to 14 cavities, fillings or missing teeth. Toothpaste was often not available, and toothbrushes did not conform to standards of modern dentistry.Under Lenin, the government gave small language groups their own writing systems. The development of these writing systems was highly successful, even though some flaws were detected. During the later days of the USSR, countries with the same multilingual situation implemented similar policies. A serious problem when creating these writing systems was that the languages differed dialectally greatly from each other. When a language had been given a writing system and appeared in a notable publication, it would attain "official language" status. There were many minority languages which never received their own writing system; therefore, their speakers were forced to have a second language. There are examples where the government retreated from this policy, most notably under Stalin where education was discontinued in languages that were not widespread. These languages were then assimilated into another language, mostly Russian. During World War II, some minority languages were banned, and their speakers accused of collaborating with the enemy.As the most widely spoken of the Soviet Union's many languages, Russian "de facto" functioned as an official language, as the "language of interethnic communication" (), but only assumed the "de jure" status as the official national language in 1990.Christianity and Islam had the highest number of adherents among the religious citizens. Eastern Christianity predominated among Christians, with Russia's traditional Russian Orthodox Church being the largest Christian denomination. About 90% of the Soviet Union's Muslims were Sunnis, with Shias being concentrated in the Azerbaijan SSR. Smaller groups included Roman Catholics, Jews, Buddhists, and a variety of Protestant denominations (especially Baptists and Lutherans).Religious influence had been strong in the Russian Empire. The Russian Orthodox Church enjoyed a privileged status as the church of the monarchy and took part in carrying out official state functions. The immediate period following the establishment of the Soviet state included a struggle against the Orthodox Church, which the revolutionaries considered an ally of the former ruling classes.In Soviet law, the "freedom to hold religious services" was constitutionally guaranteed, although the ruling Communist Party regarded religion as incompatible with the Marxist spirit of scientific materialism. In practice, the Soviet system subscribed to a narrow interpretation of this right, and in fact utilized a range of official measures to discourage religion and curb the activities of religious groups.The 1918 Council of People's Commissars decree establishing the Russian SFSR as a secular state also decreed that "the teaching of religion in all [places] where subjects of general instruction are taught, is forbidden. Citizens may teach and may be taught religion privately." Among further restrictions, those adopted in 1929 included express prohibitions on a range of church activities, including meetings for organized Bible study. Both Christian and non-Christian establishments were shut down by the thousands in the 1920s and 1930s. By 1940, as many as 90% of the churches, synagogues, and mosques that had been operating in 1917 were closed.Under the doctrine of state atheism, a "government-sponsored program of forced conversion to atheism" was conducted. The government targeted religions based on state interests, and while most organized religions were never outlawed, religious property was confiscated, believers were harassed, and religion was ridiculed while atheism was propagated in schools. In 1925, the government founded the League of Militant Atheists to intensify the propaganda campaign. Accordingly, although personal expressions of religious faith were not explicitly banned, a strong sense of social stigma was imposed on them by the formal structures and mass media, and it was generally considered unacceptable for members of certain professions (teachers, state bureaucrats, soldiers) to be openly religious. While persecution accelerated following Stalin's rise to power, a revival of Orthodoxy was fostered by the government during World War II and the Soviet authorities sought to control the Russian Orthodox Church rather than liquidate it. During the first five years of Soviet power, the Bolsheviks executed 28 Russian Orthodox bishops and over 1,200 Russian Orthodox priests. Many others were imprisoned or exiled. Believers were harassed and persecuted. Most seminaries were closed, and the publication of most religious material was prohibited. By 1941, only 500 churches remained open out of about 54,000 in existence before World War I.Convinced that religious anti-Sovietism had become a thing of the past, and with the looming threat of war, the Stalin regime began shifting to a more moderate religion policy in the late 1930s. Soviet religious establishments overwhelmingly rallied to support the war effort during World War II. Amid other accommodations to religious faith after the German invasion, churches were reopened. Radio Moscow began broadcasting a religious hour, and a historic meeting between Stalin and Orthodox Church leader Patriarch Sergius of Moscow was held in 1943. Stalin had the support of the majority of the religious people in the USSR even through the late 1980s. The general tendency of this period was an increase in religious activity among believers of all faiths.Under Nikita Khrushchev, the state leadership clashed with the churches in 1958–1964, a period when atheism was emphasized in the educational curriculum, and numerous state publications promoted atheistic views. During this period, the number of churches fell from 20,000 to 10,000 from 1959 to 1965, and the number of synagogues dropped from 500 to 97. The number of working mosques also declined, falling from 1,500 to 500 within a decade.Religious institutions remained monitored by the Soviet government, but churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques were all given more leeway in the Brezhnev era. Official relations between the Orthodox Church and the government again warmed to the point that the Brezhnev government twice honored Orthodox Patriarch Alexy I with the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. A poll conducted by Soviet authorities in 1982 recorded 20% of the Soviet population as "active religious believers."The legacy of the USSR remains a controversial topic. The socio-economic nature of communist states such as the USSR, especially under Stalin, has also been much debated, varyingly being labelled a form of bureaucratic collectivism, state capitalism, state socialism, or a totally unique mode of production.The USSR implemented a broad range of policies over a long period of time, with a large amount of conflicting policies being implemented by different leaders. Some have a positive view of it whilst others are critical towards the country, calling it a repressive oligarchy. The opinions on the USSR are complex and have changed over time, with different generations having different views on the matter as well as on Soviet policies corresponding to separate time periods during its history. Leftists have largely varying views on the USSR. Whilst some leftists such as anarchists and other libertarian socialists, agree it did not give the workers control over the means of production and was a centralized oligarchy, others have more positive opinions as to the Bolshevik policies and Vladimir Lenin. Many anti-Stalinist leftists such as anarchists are extremely critical of Soviet authoritarianism and repression. Much of the criticism it receives is centered around massacres in the Soviet Union, the centralized hierarchy present in the USSR and mass political repression as well as violence towards government critics and political dissidents such as other leftists. Critics also point towards its failure to implement any substantial worker cooperatives or implementing worker liberation as well as corruption and the Soviet authoritarian nature.Many Russians and other former Soviet citizens have nostalgia for the USSR, pointing towards most infrastructure being built during Soviet times, increased job security, increased literacy rate, increased caloric intake and supposed ethnic pluralism enacted in the Soviet Union as well as political stability. The Russian Revolution is also seen in a positive light as well as the leadership of Lenin, Nikita Khrushchev and the later USSR, although many view Joseph Stalin's rule as positive for the country. In Armenia, 12% of respondents said the USSR collapse did good, while 66% said it did harm. In Kyrgyzstan, 16% of respondents said the collapse of the USSR did good, while 61% said it did harm. In a 2018 Rating Sociological Group poll, 47% of Ukrainian respondents had a positive opinion of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, who ruled the Soviet Union from 1964 to 1982. Much of the admiration of the USSR comes from the failings of the modern post-Soviet governments such as the control by oligarchs, corruption and outdated Soviet-era infrastructure as well as the rise and dominance of organised crime after the collapse of the USSR all directly leading into nostalgia for it.The 1941–45 period of World War II is still known in Russia as the "Great Patriotic War". The war became a topic of great importance in cinema, literature, history lessons at school, the mass media, and the arts. As a result of the massive losses suffered by the military and civilians during the conflict, Victory Day celebrated on 9 May is still one of the most important and emotional dates in Russia.In some post Soviet republics, there is a more negative view of the USSR, although there is no unanimity on the matter. In large part due to the Holodomor, ethnic Ukrainians have a negative view of it. Russian-speaking Ukrainians of Ukraine's southern and eastern regions have a more positive view of the USSR. In some countries with internal conflict, there is also nostalgia for the USSR, especially for refugees of the post-Soviet conflicts who have been forced to flee their homes and have been displaced. This nostalgia is less an admiration for the country or its policies than it is a longing to return to their homes and not to live in poverty. The many Russian enclaves in the former USSR republics such as Transnistria have in a general a positive remembrance of it.The left's view of the USSR is complex. While some leftists regard the USSR as an example of state capitalism or that it was an oligarchical state, other leftists admire Vladimir Lenin and the Russian Revolution.Council communists generally view the USSR as failing to create class consciousness, turning into a corrupt state in which the elite controlled society. Anarchists are critical of the country, labeling the Soviet system as "red fascism". Soviets actively destroyed anarchist organizations and anarchist communities, labeling anarchists as "enemies of the people". Factors contributing to the animosity towards the USSR included: the Soviet invasion of the anarchist Free Territory, the suppression of the anarchist Kronstadt rebellion and the response to the Norilsk uprising, in which prisoners created a radical system of government based on cooperatives and direct democracy in the Gulag. Anarchist organizations and unions were also banned during the Spanish Civil War under the Republican government by orders from the Soviet government. Due to this, anarchists generally hold a large animosity towards the USSR.The culture of the Soviet Union passed through several stages during the USSR's existence. During the first decade following the revolution, there was relative freedom and artists experimented with several different styles to find a distinctive Soviet style of art. Lenin wanted art to be accessible to the Russian people. On the other hand, hundreds of intellectuals, writers, and artists were exiled or executed, and their work banned, such as Nikolay Gumilyov who was shot for alleged conspiring against the Bolshevik regime, and Yevgeny Zamyatin.The government encouraged a variety of trends. In art and literature, numerous schools, some traditional and others radically experimental, proliferated. Communist writers Maxim Gorky and Vladimir Mayakovsky were active during this time. As a means of influencing a largely illiterate society, films received encouragement from the state, and much of director Sergei Eisenstein's best work dates from this period.During Stalin's rule, the Soviet culture was characterized by the rise and domination of the government-imposed style of socialist realism, with all other trends being severely repressed, with rare exceptions, such as Mikhail Bulgakov's works. Many writers were imprisoned and killed.Following the Khrushchev Thaw, censorship was diminished. During this time, a distinctive period of Soviet culture developed, characterized by conformist public life and an intense focus on personal life. Greater experimentation in art forms was again permissible, resulting in the production of more sophisticated and subtly critical work. The regime loosened its emphasis on socialist realism; thus, for instance, many protagonists of the novels of author Yury Trifonov concerned themselves with problems of daily life rather than with building socialism. Underground dissident literature, known as "samizdat", developed during this late period. In architecture, the Khrushchev era mostly focused on functional design as opposed to the highly decorated style of Stalin's epoch. In music, in response to the increasing popularity of forms of popular music like jazz in the West, many jazz orchestras were permitted throughout the USSR, notably the Melodiya Ensemble, named after the principle record label in the USSR.In the second half of the 1980s, Gorbachev's policies of "perestroika" and "glasnost" significantly expanded freedom of expression throughout the country in the media and the press.Founded on 20 July 1924 in Moscow, "Sovetsky Sport" was the first sports newspaper of the Soviet Union.The Soviet Olympic Committee formed on 21 April 1951, and the IOC recognized the new body in its 45th session. In the same year, when the Soviet representative Konstantin Andrianov became an IOC member, the USSR officially joined the Olympic Movement. The 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki thus became first Olympic Games for Soviet athletes. The Soviet Union was the biggest rival to the United States at the Summer Olympics, winning six of its nine appearances at the games and also topping the medal tally at the Winter Olympics six times. The Soviet Union's Olympics success has been attributed to its large investment in sports to demonstrate its superpower image and political influence on a global stage.The Soviet Union national ice hockey team won nearly every world championship and Olympic tournament between 1954 and 1991 and never failed to medal in any International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) tournament in which they competed.The advent of the state-sponsored "full-time amateur athlete" of the Eastern Bloc countries further eroded the ideology of the pure amateur, as it put the self-financed amateurs of the Western countries at a disadvantage. The Soviet Union entered teams of athletes who were all nominally students, soldiers, or working in a profession – in reality, the state paid many of these competitors to train on a full-time basis. Nevertheless, the IOC held to the traditional rules regarding amateurism.A 1989 report by a committee of the Australian Senate claimed that "there is hardly a medal winner at the Moscow Games, certainly not a gold medal winner...who is not on one sort of drug or another: usually several kinds. The Moscow Games might well have been called the Chemists' Games".A member of the IOC Medical Commission, Manfred Donike, privately ran additional tests with a new technique for identifying abnormal levels of testosterone by measuring its ratio to epitestosterone in urine. Twenty percent of the specimens he tested, including those from sixteen gold medalists, would have resulted in disciplinary proceedings had the tests been official. The results of Donike's unofficial tests later convinced the IOC to add his new technique to their testing protocols. The first documented case of "blood doping" occurred at the 1980 Summer Olympics when a runner was transfused with two pints of blood before winning medals in the 5000 m and 10,000 m.Documentation obtained in 2016 revealed the Soviet Union's plans for a statewide doping system in track and field in preparation for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Dated before the decision to boycott the 1984 Games, the document detailed the existing steroids operations of the program, along with suggestions for further enhancements. Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture prepared the communication, directed to the Soviet Union's head of track and field. Portugalov later became one of the leading figures involved in the implementation of Russian doping before the 2016 Summer Olympics.Official Soviet environmental policy has always attached great importance to actions in which human beings actively improve nature. Lenin's quote "Communism is Soviet power and electrification of the country!" in many respects summarizes the focus on modernization and industrial development. During the first five-year plan in 1928, Stalin proceeded to industrialize the country at all costs. Values such as environmental and nature protection have been completely ignored in the struggle to create a modern industrial society. After Stalin's death, they focused more on environmental issues, but the basic perception of the value of environmental protection remained the same.The Soviet media has always focused on the vast expanse of land and the virtually indestructible natural resources. This made it feel that contamination and uncontrolled exploitation of nature were not a problem. The Soviet state also firmly believed that scientific and technological progress would solve all the problems. Official ideology said that under socialism environmental problems could easily be overcome, unlike capitalist countries, where they seemingly could not be solved. The Soviet authorities had an almost unwavering belief that man could transcend nature. However, when the authorities had to admit that there were environmental problems in the USSR in the 1980s, they explained the problems in such a way that socialism had not yet been fully developed; pollution in a socialist society was only a temporary anomaly that would have been resolved if socialism had developed.The Chernobyl disaster in 1986 was the first major accident at a civilian nuclear power plant. Unparalleled in the world, it resulted in a large number of radioactive isotopes being released into the atmosphere. Radioactive doses have scattered relatively far. 4,000 new cases of thyroid cancer were reported after the incident, but this led to a relatively low number of deaths (WHO data, 2005). However, the long-term effects of the accident are unknown. Another major accident is the Kyshtym disaster.After the fall of the USSR, it was discovered that the environmental problems were greater than what the Soviet authorities admitted. The Kola Peninsula was one of the places with clear problems. Around the industrial cities of Monchegorsk and Norilsk, where nickel, for example, is mined, all forests have been destroyed by contamination, while the northern and other parts of Russia have been affected by emissions. During the 1990s, people in the West were also interested in the radioactive hazards of nuclear facilities, decommissioned nuclear submarines, and the processing of nuclear waste or spent nuclear fuel. It was also known in the early 1990s that the USSR had transported radioactive material to the Barents Sea and Kara Sea, which was later confirmed by the Russian parliament. The crash of the K-141 Kursk submarine in 2000 in the west further raised concerns. In the past, there were accidents involving submarines K-19, K-8, and K-129.
|
[
"Georgy Malenkov",
"Alexei Kosygin",
"Nikolai Ryzhkov",
"Joseph Stalin",
"Alexei Rykov",
"Ivan Silayev",
"Vladimir Lenin",
"Nikolai Bulganin",
"Nikolai Tikhonov",
"Vyacheslav Molotov",
"Valentin Pavlov"
] |
|
Who was the head of Soviet Union in Mar 18, 1959?
|
March 18, 1959
|
{
"text": [
"Nikita Khrushchev"
]
}
|
L2_Q15180_P6_6
|
Nikolai Bulganin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1955 to Mar, 1958.
Nikolai Tikhonov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1980 to Sep, 1985.
Ivan Silayev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1991 to Dec, 1991.
Alexei Kosygin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1964 to Oct, 1980.
Valentin Pavlov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jan, 1991 to Aug, 1991.
Nikolai Ryzhkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1985 to Jan, 1991.
Georgy Malenkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1953 to Feb, 1955.
Alexei Rykov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1924 to Dec, 1930.
Vyacheslav Molotov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Dec, 1930 to May, 1941.
Joseph Stalin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from May, 1941 to Mar, 1953.
Nikita Khrushchev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1958 to Oct, 1964.
Vladimir Lenin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jul, 1923 to Jan, 1924.
|
Soviet UnionThe Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a socialist state that spanned most of Europe and Asia during its existence from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a federal union of multiple national republics; in practice its government and economy were highly centralized until its final years. The country was a one-party state prior to 1990 governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with Moscow as its capital within its largest and most populous republic, the Russian SFSR. Other major urban centers were Leningrad (Russian SFSR), Kiev (Ukrainian SSR), Minsk (Byelorussian SSR), Tashkent (Uzbek SSR), Alma-Ata (Kazakh SSR) and Novosibirsk (Russian SFSR). It was the largest country in the world, covering over , and spanning eleven time zones. The Soviet Union's five biomes were tundra, taiga, steppes, desert, and mountains. Its diverse population was officially known as the Soviet people.The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 when the Bolsheviks, headed by Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Provisional Government that had earlier replaced the monarchy of the Russian Empire. They established the Russian Soviet Republic, beginning a civil war between the Bolshevik Red Army and many anti-Bolshevik forces across the former Empire, among whom the largest faction was the White Guard, which engaged in violent anti-communist repression against the Bolsheviks and their worker and peasant supporters known as the White Terror. The Red Army expanded and helped local Bolsheviks take power, establishing soviets, repressing their political opponents and rebellious peasants through Red Terror. By 1922, the Bolsheviks had emerged victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian republics. The New Economic Policy (NEP), which was introduced by Lenin, led to a partial return of a free market and private property; this resulted in a period of economic recovery.Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power. Stalin suppressed all political opposition to his rule inside the Communist Party and inaugurated a command economy. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and forced collectivization, which led to significant economic growth, but also led to a man-made famine in 1932–1933 and expanded the Gulag labour camp system originally established in 1918. Stalin also fomented political paranoia and conducted the Great Purge to remove his actual and perceived opponents from the Party through mass arrests of military leaders, Communist Party members, and ordinary citizens alike, who were then sent to correctional labor camps or sentenced to death.On 23 August 1939, after unsuccessful efforts to form an anti-fascist alliance with Western powers, the Soviets signed the non-aggression agreement with Nazi Germany. After the start of World War II, the formally neutral Soviets invaded and annexed territories of several Eastern European states, including eastern Poland and the Baltic states. In June 1941 the Germans invaded, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the cost of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at intense battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin and won World War II in Europe on 9 May 1945. The territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged in 1947 as a result of a post-war Soviet dominance in Eastern Europe, where the Eastern Bloc confronted the Western Bloc that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949.Following Stalin's death in 1953, a period known as de-Stalinization and the Khrushchev Thaw occurred under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev. The country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took an early lead in the Space Race with the first ever satellite and the first human spaceflight and the first probe to land on another planet, Venus. In the 1970s, there was a brief "détente" of relations with the United States, but tensions resumed when the Soviet Union deployed troops in Afghanistan in 1979. The war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters.In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to further reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of "glasnost" and "perestroika". The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing economic stagnation. The Cold War ended during his tenure and in 1989, Warsaw Pact countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective Marxist-Leninist regimes. Strong nationalist and separatist movements broke out across the USSR. Gorbachev initiated a referendum—boycotted by the Baltic republics, Armenia, Georgia, and Moldova—which resulted in the majority of participating citizens voting in favor of preserving the Union as a renewed federation. In August 1991, a coup d'état was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a high-profile role in facing down the coup. The main result was the banning of the Communist Party. The republics led by Russia and Ukraine declared independence. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned. All the republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states. The Russian Federation (formerly the Russian SFSR) assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations and is recognized as its continued legal personality in world affairs.The USSR produced many significant social and technological achievements and innovations regarding military power. It boasted the world's second-largest economy and the largest standing military in the world. The USSR was recognized as one of the five nuclear weapons states. It was a founding permanent member of the United Nations Security Council as well as a member of the OSCE, the WFTU and the leading member of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the Warsaw Pact.Before its dissolution, the USSR had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II. Sometimes also called "Soviet Empire", it exercised its hegemony in Eastern Europe and worldwide with military and economic strength, proxy conflicts and influence in developing countries and funding of scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The word "soviet" is derived from the Russian word "sovet" (), meaning "council", "assembly", "advice", ultimately deriving from the proto-Slavic verbal stem of "vět-iti" ("to inform"), related to Slavic "věst" ("news"), English "wise", the root in "ad-vis-or" (which came to English through French), or the Dutch "weten" ("to know"; cf. "wetenschap" meaning "science"). The word "sovietnik" means "councillor".Some organizations in Russian history were called "council" (). In the Russian Empire, the State Council which functioned from 1810 to 1917 was referred to as a Council of Ministers after the revolt of 1905.During the Georgian Affair, Vladimir Lenin envisioned an expression of Great Russian ethnic chauvinism by Joseph Stalin and his supporters, calling for these nation-states to join Russia as semi-independent parts of a greater union which he initially named as the Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia (). Stalin initially resisted the proposal but ultimately accepted it, although with Lenin's agreement changed the name to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), albeit all the republics began as "socialist soviet" and did not change to the other order until 1936. In addition, in the national languages of several republics, the word "council" or "conciliar" in the respective language was only quite late changed to an adaptation of the Russian "soviet" and never in others, e.g. Ukraine."СССР" (in Latin alphabet: "SSSR") is the abbreviation of USSR in Russian. It is written in Cyrillic letters. The Soviets used the Cyrillic abbreviation so frequently that audiences worldwide became familiar with its meaning. Notably, both Cyrillic letters used have homoglyphic (but transliterally distinct) letters in Latin alphabets. Because of widespread familiarity with the Cyrillic abbreviation, Latin alphabet users in particular almost always use the Latin homoglyphs "C" and "P" (as opposed to the transliteral Latin letters "S" and "R") when rendering the USSR's native abbreviation.After "СССР", the most common short form names for the Soviet state in Russian were "Советский Союз" (transliteration: "Sovetskiy Soyuz") which literally means "Soviet Union", and also "Союз ССР" (transliteration: "Soyuz SSR") which, after compensating for grammatical differences, essentially translates to "Union of SSR's" in English.In the English language media, the state was referred to as the Soviet Union or the USSR. In other European languages, the locally translated short forms and abbreviations are usually used such as "Union soviétique" and "URSS" in French, or "Sowjetunion" and "UdSSR" in German. In the English-speaking world, the Soviet Union was also informally called Russia and its citizens Russians, although that was technically incorrect since Russia was only one of the republics. Such misapplications of the linguistic equivalents to the term "Russia" and its derivatives were frequent in other languages as well.The Soviet Union covered an area of over , and was the world's largest country, a status that is retained by its successor state, Russia. It covered a sixth of Earth's land surface, and its size was comparable to the continent of North America. Its western part in Europe accounted for a quarter of the country's area and was the cultural and economic center. The eastern part in Asia extended to the Pacific Ocean to the east and Afghanistan to the south, and, except some areas in Central Asia, was much less populous. It spanned over east to west across eleven time zones, and over north to south. It had five climate zones: tundra, taiga, steppes, desert and mountains.The Soviet Union, similarly to Russia, had the world's longest border, measuring over , or circumferences of Earth. Two-thirds of it was a coastline. The country bordered Afghanistan, China, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Hungary, Iran, Mongolia, North Korea, Norway, Poland, Romania, and Turkey from 1945 to 1991. The Bering Strait separated the country from the United States, while the La Pérouse Strait separated it from Japan.The Soviet Union's highest mountain was Communism Peak (now Ismoil Somoni Peak) in Tajik SSR, at . It also included most of the world's largest lakes; the Caspian Sea (shared with Iran), and Lake Baikal in Russia, the world's largest and deepest freshwater lake.Modern revolutionary activity in the Russian Empire began with the 1825 Decembrist revolt. Although serfdom was abolished in 1861, it was done on terms unfavorable to the peasants and served to encourage revolutionaries. A parliament—the State Duma—was established in 1906 after the Russian Revolution of 1905, but Tsar Nicholas II resisted attempts to move from absolute to a constitutional monarchy. Social unrest continued and was aggravated during World War I by military defeat and food shortages in major cities.A spontaneous popular uprising in Petrograd, in response to the wartime decay of Russia's economy and morale, culminated in the February Revolution and the toppling of Nicholas II and the imperial government in March 1917. The tsarist autocracy was replaced by the Russian Provisional Government, which intended to conduct elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly and to continue fighting on the side of the Entente in World War I.At the same time, workers' councils, known in Russian as "Soviets", sprang up across the country. The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, pushed for socialist revolution in the Soviets and on the streets. On 7 November 1917, the Red Guards stormed the Winter Palace in Petrograd, ending the rule of the Provisional Government and leaving all political power to the Soviets. This event would later be officially known in Soviet bibliographies as the Great October Socialist Revolution. In December, the Bolsheviks signed an armistice with the Central Powers, though by February 1918, fighting had resumed. In March, the Soviets ended involvement in the war and signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.A long and bloody Civil War ensued between the Reds and the Whites, starting in 1917 and ending in 1923 with the Reds' victory. It included foreign intervention, the execution of the former tsar and his family, and the famine of 1921, which killed about five million people. In March 1921, during a related conflict with Poland, the Peace of Riga was signed, splitting disputed territories in Belarus and Ukraine between the Republic of Poland and Soviet Russia. Soviet Russia had to resolve similar conflicts with the newly established republics of Estonia, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania.On 28 December 1922, a conference of plenipotentiary delegations from the Russian SFSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR approved the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and the Declaration of the Creation of the USSR, forming the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. These two documents were confirmed by the first Congress of Soviets of the USSR and signed by the heads of the delegations, Mikhail Kalinin, Mikhail Tskhakaya, Mikhail Frunze, Grigory Petrovsky, and Alexander Chervyakov, on 30 December 1922. The formal proclamation was made from the stage of the Bolshoi Theatre.An intensive restructuring of the economy, industry and politics of the country began in the early days of Soviet power in 1917. A large part of this was done according to the Bolshevik Initial Decrees, government documents signed by Vladimir Lenin. One of the most prominent breakthroughs was the GOELRO plan, which envisioned a major restructuring of the Soviet economy based on total electrification of the country. The plan became the prototype for subsequent Five-Year Plans and was fulfilled by 1931. After the economic policy of "War communism" during the Russian Civil War, as a prelude to fully developing socialism in the country, the Soviet government permitted some private enterprise to coexist alongside nationalized industry in the 1920s, and total food requisition in the countryside was replaced by a food tax.From its creation, the government in the Soviet Union was based on the one-party rule of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks). The stated purpose was to prevent the return of capitalist exploitation, and that the principles of democratic centralism would be the most effective in representing the people's will in a practical manner. The debate over the future of the economy provided the background for a power struggle in the years after Lenin's death in 1924. Initially, Lenin was to be replaced by a "troika" consisting of Grigory Zinoviev of the Ukrainian SSR, Lev Kamenev of the Russian SFSR, and Joseph Stalin of the Transcaucasian SFSR.On 1 February 1924, the USSR was recognized by the United Kingdom. The same year, a Soviet Constitution was approved, legitimizing the December 1922 union. According to Archie Brown the constitution was never an accurate guide to political reality in the USSR. For example the fact that the Party played the leading role in making and enforcing policy was not mentioned in it until 1977. The USSR was a federative entity of many constituent republics, each with its own political and administrative entities. However, the term "Soviet Russia"strictly applicable only to the Russian Federative Socialist Republicwas often applied to the entire country by non-Soviet writers.On 3 April 1922, Stalin was named the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Lenin had appointed Stalin the head of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate, which gave Stalin considerable power. By gradually consolidating his influence and isolating and outmanoeuvring his rivals within the party, Stalin became the undisputed leader of the country and, by the end of the 1920s, established a totalitarian rule. In October 1927, Zinoviev and Leon Trotsky were expelled from the Central Committee and forced into exile.In 1928, Stalin introduced the first five-year plan for building a socialist economy. In place of the internationalism expressed by Lenin throughout the Revolution, it aimed to build Socialism in One Country. In industry, the state assumed control over all existing enterprises and undertook an intensive program of industrialization. In agriculture, rather than adhering to the "lead by example" policy advocated by Lenin, forced collectivization of farms was implemented all over the country.Famines ensued as a result, causing deaths estimated at three to seven million; surviving kulaks were persecuted, and many were sent to Gulags to do forced labor. Social upheaval continued in the mid-1930s. Despite the turmoil of the mid-to-late 1930s, the country developed a robust industrial economy in the years preceding World War II.Closer cooperation between the USSR and the West developed in the early 1930s. From 1932 to 1934, the country participated in the World Disarmament Conference. In 1933, diplomatic relations between the United States and the USSR were established when in November, the newly elected President of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, chose to recognize Stalin's Communist government formally and negotiated a new trade agreement between the two countries. In September 1934, the country joined the League of Nations. After the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, the USSR actively supported the Republican forces against the Nationalists, who were supported by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany.In December 1936, Stalin unveiled a new constitution that was praised by supporters around the world as the most democratic constitution imaginable, though there was some skepticism. Stalin's Great Purge resulted in the detainment or execution of many "Old Bolsheviks" who had participated in the October Revolution with Lenin. According to declassified Soviet archives, the NKVD arrested more than one and a half million people in 1937 and 1938, of whom 681,692 were shot. Over those two years, there were an average of over one thousand executions a day.In 1939, after attempts to form a military alliance with Britain and France against Germany failed, the Soviet Union made a dramatic shift towards Nazi Germany. Almost a year after Britain and France had concluded the Munich Agreement with Germany, the Soviet Union made agreements with Germany as well, both militarily and economically during extensive talks. The two countries concluded the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and the German–Soviet Commercial Agreement in August 1939. The former made possible the Soviet occupation of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bessarabia, northern Bukovina, and eastern Poland, while the Soviets remained formally neutral. In late November, unable to coerce the Republic of Finland by diplomatic means into moving its border back from Leningrad, Stalin ordered the invasion of Finland. In the east, the Soviet military won several decisive victories during border clashes with the Empire of Japan in 1938 and 1939. However, in April 1941, the USSR signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact with Japan, recognizing the territorial integrity of Manchukuo, a Japanese puppet state.Germany broke the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 starting what was known in the USSR as the Great Patriotic War. The Red Army stopped the seemingly invincible German Army at the Battle of Moscow. The Battle of Stalingrad, which lasted from late 1942 to early 1943, dealt a severe blow to Germany from which they never fully recovered and became a turning point in the war. After Stalingrad, Soviet forces drove through Eastern Europe to Berlin before Germany surrendered in 1945. The German Army suffered 80% of its military deaths in the Eastern Front. Harry Hopkins, a close foreign policy advisor to Franklin D. Roosevelt, spoke on 10 August 1943 of the USSR's decisive role in the war.In the same year, the USSR, in fulfilment of its agreement with the Allies at the Yalta Conference, denounced the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1945 and invaded Manchukuo and other Japan-controlled territories on 9 August 1945. This conflict ended with a decisive Soviet victory, contributing to the unconditional surrender of Japan and the end of World War II.The USSR suffered greatly in the war, losing around 27 million people. Approximately 2.8 million Soviet POWs died of starvation, mistreatment, or executions in just eight months of 1941–42. During the war, the country together with the United States, the United Kingdom and China were considered the Big Four Allied powers, and later became the Four Policemen that formed the basis of the United Nations Security Council. It emerged as a superpower in the post-war period. Once denied diplomatic recognition by the Western world, the USSR had official relations with practically every country by the late 1940s. A member of the United Nations at its foundation in 1945, the country became one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, which gave it the right to veto any of its resolutions.During the immediate post-war period, the Soviet Union rebuilt and expanded its economy, while maintaining its strictly centralized control. It took effective control over most of the countries of Eastern Europe (except Yugoslavia and later Albania), turning them into satellite states. The USSR bound its satellite states in a military alliance, the Warsaw Pact, in 1955, and an economic organization, Council for Mutual Economic Assistance or Comecon, a counterpart to the European Economic Community (EEC), from 1949 to 1991. The USSR concentrated on its own recovery, seizing and transferring most of Germany's industrial plants, and it exacted war reparations from East Germany, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria using Soviet-dominated joint enterprises. It also instituted trading arrangements deliberately designed to favor the country. Moscow controlled the Communist parties that ruled the satellite states, and they followed orders from the Kremlin. Later, the Comecon supplied aid to the eventually victorious Communist Party of China, and its influence grew elsewhere in the world. Fearing its ambitions, the Soviet Union's wartime allies, the United Kingdom and the United States, became its enemies. In the ensuing Cold War, the two sides clashed indirectly in proxy wars.Stalin died on 5 March 1953. Without a mutually agreeable successor, the highest Communist Party officials initially opted to rule the Soviet Union jointly through a troika headed by Georgy Malenkov. This did not last, however, and Nikita Khrushchev eventually won the ensuing power struggle by the mid-1950s. In 1956, he denounced Joseph Stalin and proceeded to ease controls over the party and society. This was known as de-Stalinization.Moscow considered Eastern Europe to be a critically vital buffer zone for the forward defence of its western borders, in case of another major invasion such as the German invasion of 1941. For this reason, the USSR sought to cement its control of the region by transforming the Eastern European countries into satellite states, dependent upon and subservient to its leadership. As a result, Soviet military forces were used to suppress an anti-communist uprising in Hungary in 1956.In the late 1950s, a confrontation with China regarding the Soviet rapprochement with the West, and what Mao Zedong perceived as Khrushchev's revisionism, led to the Sino–Soviet split. This resulted in a break throughout the global Marxist–Leninist movement, with the governments in Albania, Cambodia and Somalia choosing to ally with China.During this period of the late 1950s and early 1960s, the USSR continued to realize scientific and technological exploits in the Space Race, rivaling the United States: launching the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1 in 1957; a living dog named Laika in 1957; the first human being, Yuri Gagarin in 1961; the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova in 1963; Alexei Leonov, the first person to walk in space in 1965; the first soft landing on the Moon by spacecraft Luna 9 in 1966; and the first Moon rovers, Lunokhod 1 and Lunokhod 2.Khrushchev initiated "The Thaw", a complex shift in political, cultural and economic life in the country. This included some openness and contact with other nations and new social and economic policies with more emphasis on commodity goods, allowing a dramatic rise in living standards while maintaining high levels of economic growth. Censorship was relaxed as well. Khrushchev's reforms in agriculture and administration, however, were generally unproductive. In 1962, he precipitated a crisis with the United States over the Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles in Cuba. An agreement was made with the United States to remove nuclear missiles from both Cuba and Turkey, concluding the crisis. This event caused Khrushchev much embarrassment and loss of prestige, resulting in his removal from power in 1964.Following the ousting of Khrushchev, another period of collective leadership ensued, consisting of Leonid Brezhnev as General Secretary, Alexei Kosygin as Premier and Nikolai Podgorny as Chairman of the Presidium, lasting until Brezhnev established himself in the early 1970s as the preeminent Soviet leader.In 1968, the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact allies invaded Czechoslovakia to halt the Prague Spring reforms. In the aftermath, Brezhnev justified the invasion and previous military interventions as well as any potential military interventions in the future by introducing the Brezhnev Doctrine, which proclaimed any threat to socialist rule in a Warsaw Pact state as a threat to all Warsaw Pact states, therefore justifying military intervention.Brezhnev presided throughout "détente" with the West that resulted in treaties on armament control (SALT I, SALT II, Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty) while at the same time building up Soviet military might.In October 1977, the third Soviet Constitution was unanimously adopted. The prevailing mood of the Soviet leadership at the time of Brezhnev's death in 1982 was one of aversion to change. The long period of Brezhnev's rule had come to be dubbed one of "standstill", with an ageing and ossified top political leadership. This period is also known as the Era of Stagnation, a period of adverse economic, political, and social effects in the country, which began during the rule of Brezhnev and continued under his successors Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko.In late 1979, the Soviet Union's military intervened in the ongoing civil war in neighboring Afghanistan, effectively ending a détente with the West.Two developments dominated the decade that followed: the increasingly apparent crumbling of the Soviet Union's economic and political structures, and the patchwork attempts at reforms to reverse that process. Kenneth S. Deffeyes argued in "Beyond Oil" that the Reagan administration encouraged Saudi Arabia to lower the price of oil to the point where the Soviets could not make a profit selling their oil, and resulted in the depletion of the country's hard currency reserves.Brezhnev's next two successors, transitional figures with deep roots in his tradition, did not last long. Yuri Andropov was 68 years old and Konstantin Chernenko 72 when they assumed power; both died in less than two years. In an attempt to avoid a third short-lived leader, in 1985, the Soviets turned to the next generation and selected Mikhail Gorbachev. He made significant changes in the economy and party leadership, called "perestroika". His policy of "glasnost" freed public access to information after decades of heavy government censorship. Gorbachev also moved to end the Cold War. In 1988, the USSR abandoned its war in Afghanistan and began to withdraw its forces. In the following year, Gorbachev refused to interfere in the internal affairs of the Soviet satellite states, which paved the way for the Revolutions of 1989. In particular, the standstill of the Soviet Union at the Pan-European Picnic in August 1989 then set a peaceful chain reaction in motion at the end of which the Eastern Bloc collapsed. With the tearing down of the Berlin Wall and with East and West Germany pursuing unification, the Iron Curtain between the West and Soviet-controlled regions came down.At the same time, the Soviet republics started legal moves towards potentially declaring sovereignty over their territories, citing the freedom to secede in Article 72 of the USSR constitution. On 7 April 1990, a law was passed allowing a republic to secede if more than two-thirds of its residents voted for it in a referendum. Many held their first free elections in the Soviet era for their own national legislatures in 1990. Many of these legislatures proceeded to produce legislation contradicting the Union laws in what was known as the "War of Laws". In 1989, the Russian SFSR convened a newly elected Congress of People's Deputies. Boris Yeltsin was elected its chairman. On 12 June 1990, the Congress declared Russia's sovereignty over its territory and proceeded to pass laws that attempted to supersede some of the Soviet laws. After a landslide victory of Sąjūdis in Lithuania, that country declared its independence restored on 11 March 1990.A referendum for the preservation of the USSR was held on 17 March 1991 in nine republics (the remainder having boycotted the vote), with the majority of the population in those republics voting for preservation of the Union. The referendum gave Gorbachev a minor boost. In the summer of 1991, the New Union Treaty, which would have turned the country into a much looser Union, was agreed upon by eight republics. The signing of the treaty, however, was interrupted by the August Coup—an attempted coup d'état by hardline members of the government and the KGB who sought to reverse Gorbachev's reforms and reassert the central government's control over the republics. After the coup collapsed, Yeltsin was seen as a hero for his decisive actions, while Gorbachev's power was effectively ended. The balance of power tipped significantly towards the republics. In August 1991, Latvia and Estonia immediately declared the restoration of their full independence (following Lithuania's 1990 example). Gorbachev resigned as general secretary in late August, and soon afterwards, the party's activities were indefinitely suspended—effectively ending its rule. By the fall, Gorbachev could no longer influence events outside Moscow, and he was being challenged even there by Yeltsin, who had been elected President of Russia in July 1991.The remaining 12 republics continued discussing new, increasingly looser, models of the Union. However, by December all except Russia and Kazakhstan had formally declared independence. During this time, Yeltsin took over what remained of the Soviet government, including the Moscow Kremlin. The final blow was struck on 1 December when Ukraine, the second-most powerful republic, voted overwhelmingly for independence. Ukraine's secession ended any realistic chance of the country staying together even on a limited scale.On 8 December 1991, the presidents of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus (formerly Byelorussia), signed the Belavezha Accords, which declared the Soviet Union dissolved and established the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in its place. While doubts remained over the authority of the accords to do this, on 21 December 1991, the representatives of all Soviet republics except Georgia signed the Alma-Ata Protocol, which confirmed the accords. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned as the President of the USSR, declaring the office extinct. He turned the powers that had been vested in the presidency over to Yeltsin. That night, the Soviet flag was lowered for the last time, and the Russian tricolor was raised in its place.The following day, the Supreme Soviet, the highest governmental body, voted both itself and the country out of existence. This is generally recognized as marking the official, final dissolution of the Soviet Union as a functioning state, and the end of the Cold War. The Soviet Army initially remained under overall CIS command but was soon absorbed into the different military forces of the newly independent states. The few remaining Soviet institutions that had not been taken over by Russia ceased to function by the end of 1991.Following the dissolution, Russia was internationally recognized as its legal successor on the international stage. To that end, Russia voluntarily accepted all Soviet foreign debt and claimed Soviet overseas properties as its own. Under the 1992 Lisbon Protocol, Russia also agreed to receive all nuclear weapons remaining in the territory of other former Soviet republics. Since then, the Russian Federation has assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations. Ukraine has refused to recognize exclusive Russian claims to succession of the USSR and claimed such status for Ukraine as well, which was codified in Articles 7 and 8 of its 1991 law On Legal Succession of Ukraine. Since its independence in 1991, Ukraine has continued to pursue claims against Russia in foreign courts, seeking to recover its share of the foreign property that was owned by the USSR.The dissolution was followed by a severe drop in economic and social conditions in post-Soviet states, including a rapid increase in poverty, crime, corruption, unemployment, homelessness, rates of disease, infant mortality and domestic violence, as well as demographic losses and income inequality and the rise of an oligarchical class, along with decreases in calorie intake, life expectancy, adult literacy, and income. Between 1988–1989 and 1993–1995, the Gini ratio increased by an average of 9 points for all former socialist countries. The economic shocks that accompanied wholesale privatization were associated with sharp increases in mortality. Data shows Russia, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia saw a tripling of unemployment and a 42% increase in male death rates between 1991 and 1994. In the following decades, only five or six of the post-communist states are on a path to joining the wealthy capitalist West while most are falling behind, some to such an extent that it will take over fifty years to catch up to where they were before the fall of the Soviet Bloc.In summing up the international ramifications of these events, Vladislav Zubok stated: "The collapse of the Soviet empire was an event of epochal geopolitical, military, ideological, and economic significance." Before the dissolution, the country had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, military strength, economic strength, aid to developing countries, and scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The analysis of the succession of states for the 15 post-Soviet states is complex. The Russian Federation is seen as the legal "continuator" state and is for most purposes the heir to the Soviet Union. It retained ownership of all former Soviet embassy properties, as well as the old Soviet UN membership and permanent membership on the Security Council.Of the two other co-founding states of the USSR at the time of the dissolution, Ukraine was the only one that had passed laws, similar to Russia, that it is a state-successor of both the Ukrainian SSR and the USSR. Soviet treaties laid groundwork for Ukraine's future foreign agreements as well as they led to Ukraine agreeing to undertake 16.37% of debts of the Soviet Union for which it was going to receive its share of USSR's foreign property. Although it had a tough position at the time, due to Russia's position as a "single continuation of the USSR" that became widely accepted in the West as well as a constant pressure from the Western countries, allowed Russia to dispose state property of USSR abroad and conceal information about it. Due to that Ukraine never ratified "zero option" agreement that Russian Federation had signed with other former Soviet republics, as it denied disclosing of information about Soviet Gold Reserves and its Diamond Fund. The dispute over former Soviet property and assets between the two former republics is still ongoing:Similar situation occurred with restitution of cultural property. Although on 14 February 1992 Russia and other former Soviet republics signed agreement "On the return of cultural and historic property to the origin states" in Minsk, it was halted by Russian State Duma that had eventually passed "Federal Law on Cultural Valuables Displaced to the USSR as a Result of the Second World War and Located on the Territory of the Russian Federation" which made restitution currently impossible.There are additionally four states that claim independence from the other internationally recognised post-Soviet states but possess limited international recognition: Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia and Transnistria. The Chechen separatist movement of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria lacks any international recognition.During his rule, Stalin always made the final policy decisions. Otherwise, Soviet foreign policy was set by the commission on the Foreign Policy of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, or by the party's highest body the Politburo. Operations were handled by the separate Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It was known as the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (or Narkomindel), until 1946. The most influential spokesmen were Georgy Chicherin (1872–1936), Maxim Litvinov (1876–1951), Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986), Andrey Vyshinsky (1883–1954) and Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989). Intellectuals were based in the Moscow State Institute of International Relations.The Marxist-Leninist leadership of the Soviet Union intensely debated foreign policy issues and change directions several times. Even after Stalin assumed dictatorial control in the late 1920s, there were debates, and he frequently changed positions.During the country's early period, it was assumed that Communist revolutions would break out soon in every major industrial country, and it was the Soviet responsibility to assist them. The Comintern was the weapon of choice. A few revolutions did break out, but they were quickly suppressed (the longest lasting one was in Hungary)—the Hungarian Soviet Republic—lasted only from 21 March 1919 to 1 August 1919. The Russian Bolsheviks were in no position to give any help.By 1921, Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin realized that capitalism had stabilized itself in Europe and there would not be any widespread revolutions anytime soon. It became the duty of the Russian Bolsheviks to protect what they had in Russia, and avoid military confrontations that might destroy their bridgehead. Russia was now a pariah state, along with Germany. The two came to terms in 1922 with the Treaty of Rapallo that settled long-standing grievances. At the same time, the two countries secretly set up training programs for the illegal German army and air force operations at hidden camps in the USSR.Moscow eventually stopped threatening other states, and instead worked to open peaceful relationships in terms of trade, and diplomatic recognition. The United Kingdom dismissed the warnings of Winston Churchill and a few others about a continuing Marxist-Leninist threat, and opened trade relations and "de facto" diplomatic recognition in 1922. There was hope for a settlement of the pre-war Tsarist debts, but it was repeatedly postponed. Formal recognition came when the new Labour Party came to power in 1924. All the other countries followed suit in opening trade relations. Henry Ford opened large-scale business relations with the Soviets in the late 1920s, hoping that it would lead to long-term peace. Finally, in 1933, the United States officially recognized the USSR, a decision backed by the public opinion and especially by US business interests that expected an opening of a new profitable market.In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Stalin ordered Marxist-Leninist parties across the world to strongly oppose non-Marxist political parties, labor unions or other organizations on the left. Stalin reversed himself in 1934 with the Popular Front program that called on all Marxist parties to join together with all anti-Fascist political, labor, and organizational forces that were opposed to fascism, especially of the Nazi variety.In 1939, half a year after the Munich Agreement, the USSR attempted to form an anti-Nazi alliance with France and Britain. Adolf Hitler proposed a better deal, which would give the USSR control over much of Eastern Europe through the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In September, Germany invaded Poland, and the USSR also invaded later that month, resulting in the partition of Poland. In response, Britain and France declared war on Germany, marking the beginning of World War II.There were three power hierarchies in the Soviet Union: the legislature represented by the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, the government represented by the Council of Ministers, and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), the only legal party and the final policymaker in the country.At the top of the Communist Party was the Central Committee, elected at Party Congresses and Conferences. In turn, the Central Committee voted for a Politburo (called the Presidium between 1952 and 1966), Secretariat and the General Secretary (First Secretary from 1953 to 1966), the "de facto" highest office in the Soviet Union. Depending on the degree of power consolidation, it was either the Politburo as a collective body or the General Secretary, who always was one of the Politburo members, that effectively led the party and the country (except for the period of the highly personalized authority of Stalin, exercised directly through his position in the Council of Ministers rather than the Politburo after 1941). They were not controlled by the general party membership, as the key principle of the party organization was democratic centralism, demanding strict subordination to higher bodies, and elections went uncontested, endorsing the candidates proposed from above.The Communist Party maintained its dominance over the state mainly through its control over the system of appointments. All senior government officials and most deputies of the Supreme Soviet were members of the CPSU. Of the party heads themselves, Stalin (1941–1953) and Khrushchev (1958–1964) were Premiers. Upon the forced retirement of Khrushchev, the party leader was prohibited from this kind of double membership, but the later General Secretaries for at least some part of their tenure occupied the mostly ceremonial position of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, the nominal head of state. The institutions at lower levels were overseen and at times supplanted by primary party organizations.However, in practice the degree of control the party was able to exercise over the state bureaucracy, particularly after the death of Stalin, was far from total, with the bureaucracy pursuing different interests that were at times in conflict with the party. Nor was the party itself monolithic from top to bottom, although factions were officially banned.The Supreme Soviet (successor of the Congress of Soviets) was nominally the highest state body for most of the Soviet history, at first acting as a rubber stamp institution, approving and implementing all decisions made by the party. However, its powers and functions were extended in the late 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, including the creation of new state commissions and committees. It gained additional powers relating to the approval of the Five-Year Plans and the government budget. The Supreme Soviet elected a Presidium (successor of the Central Executive Committee) to wield its power between plenary sessions, ordinarily held twice a year, and appointed the Supreme Court, the Procurator General and the Council of Ministers (known before 1946 as the Council of People's Commissars), headed by the Chairman (Premier) and managing an enormous bureaucracy responsible for the administration of the economy and society. State and party structures of the constituent republics largely emulated the structure of the central institutions, although the Russian SFSR, unlike the other constituent republics, for most of its history had no republican branch of the CPSU, being ruled directly by the union-wide party until 1990. Local authorities were organized likewise into party committees, local Soviets and executive committees. While the state system was nominally federal, the party was unitary.The state security police (the KGB and ) played an important role in Soviet politics. It was instrumental in the Great Purge, but was brought under strict party control after Stalin's death. Under Yuri Andropov, the KGB engaged in the suppression of political dissent and maintained an extensive network of informers, reasserting itself as a political actor to some extent independent of the party-state structure, culminating in the anti-corruption campaign targeting high-ranking party officials in the late 1970s and early 1980s.The constitution, which was promulgated in 1924, 1936 and 1977, did not limit state power. No formal separation of powers existed between the Party, Supreme Soviet and Council of Ministers that represented executive and legislative branches of the government. The system was governed less by statute than by informal conventions, and no settled mechanism of leadership succession existed. Bitter and at times deadly power struggles took place in the Politburo after the deaths of Lenin and Stalin, as well as after Khrushchev's dismissal, itself due to a decision by both the Politburo and the Central Committee. All leaders of the Communist Party before Gorbachev died in office, except Georgy Malenkov and Khrushchev, both dismissed from the party leadership amid internal struggle within the party.Between 1988 and 1990, facing considerable opposition, Mikhail Gorbachev enacted reforms shifting power away from the highest bodies of the party and making the Supreme Soviet less dependent on them. The Congress of People's Deputies was established, the majority of whose members were directly elected in competitive elections held in March 1989. The Congress now elected the Supreme Soviet, which became a full-time parliament, and much stronger than before. For the first time since the 1920s, it refused to rubber stamp proposals from the party and Council of Ministers. In 1990, Gorbachev introduced and assumed the position of the President of the Soviet Union, concentrated power in his executive office, independent of the party, and subordinated the government, now renamed the Cabinet of Ministers of the USSR, to himself.Tensions grew between the Union-wide authorities under Gorbachev, reformists led in Russia by Boris Yeltsin and controlling the newly elected Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR, and communist hardliners. On 19–21 August 1991, a group of hardliners staged a coup attempt. The coup failed, and the State Council of the Soviet Union became the highest organ of state power "in the period of transition". Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary, only remaining President for the final months of the existence of the USSR.The judiciary was not independent of the other branches of government. The Supreme Court supervised the lower courts (People's Court) and applied the law as established by the constitution or as interpreted by the Supreme Soviet. The Constitutional Oversight Committee reviewed the constitutionality of laws and acts. The Soviet Union used the inquisitorial system of Roman law, where the judge, procurator, and defence attorney collaborate to establish the truth.Constitutionally, the USSR was a federation of constituent Union Republics, which were either unitary states, such as Ukraine or Byelorussia (SSRs), or federations, such as Russia or Transcaucasia (SFSRs), all four being the founding republics who signed the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR in December 1922. In 1924, during the national delimitation in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were formed from parts of Russia's Turkestan ASSR and two Soviet dependencies, the Khorezm and Bukharan SSRs. In 1929, Tajikistan was split off from the Uzbekistan SSR. With the constitution of 1936, the Transcaucasian SFSR was dissolved, resulting in its constituent republics of Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan being elevated to Union Republics, while Kazakhstan and Kirghizia were split off from Russian SFSR, resulting in the same status. In August 1940, Moldavia was formed from parts of Ukraine and Bessarabia and northern Bukovina. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (SSRs) were also admitted into the union which was not recognized by most of the international community and was considered an illegal occupation. Karelia was split off from Russia as a Union Republic in March 1940 and was reabsorbed in 1956. Between July 1956 and September 1991, there were 15 union republics (see map below).While nominally a union of equals, in practice the Soviet Union was dominated by Russians. The domination was so absolute that for most of its existence, the country was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to as "Russia". While the RSFSR was technically only one republic within the larger union, it was by far the largest (both in terms of population and area), most powerful, most developed, and the industrial center of the Soviet Union. Historian Matthew White wrote that it was an open secret that the country's federal structure was "window dressing" for Russian dominance. For that reason, the people of the USSR were usually called "Russians", not "Soviets", since "everyone knew who really ran the show".Under the Military Law of September 1925, the Soviet Armed Forces consisted of the Land Forces, the Air Force, the Navy, Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU), and the Internal Troops. The OGPU later became independent and in 1934 joined the NKVD, and so its internal troops were under the joint leadership of the defense and internal commissariats. After World War II, Strategic Missile Forces (1959), Air Defense Forces (1948) and National Civil Defense Forces (1970) were formed, which ranked first, third, and sixth in the official Soviet system of importance (ground forces were second, Air Force Fourth, and Navy Fifth).The army had the greatest political influence. In 1989, there served two million soldiers divided between 150 motorized and 52 armored divisions. Until the early 1960s, the Soviet navy was a rather small military branch, but after the Caribbean crisis, under the leadership of Sergei Gorshkov, it expanded significantly. It became known for battlecruisers and submarines. In 1989 there served 500 000 men. The Soviet Air Force focused on a fleet of strategic bombers and during war situation was to eradicate enemy infrastructure and nuclear capacity. The air force also had a number of fighters and tactical bombers to support the army in the war. Strategic missile forces had more than 1,400 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), deployed between 28 bases and 300 command centers.In the post-war period, the Soviet Army was directly involved in several military operations abroad. These included the suppression of the uprising in East Germany (1953), Hungarian revolution (1956) and the invasion of Czechoslovakia (1968). The Soviet Union also participated in the war in Afghanistan between 1979 and 1989.In the Soviet Union, general conscription applied.At the end of the 1950s, with the help of engineers and technologies captured and imported from defeated Nazi Germany, the Soviets constructed the first satellite – Sputnik 1 and thus overtook the United States in terms of utilizing space. This was followed by other successful satellites, where test dogs flight was sent. On April 12, 1961, the first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, was sent to the space. He once flew around the Earth and successfully landed in the Kazakh steppe. At that time, the first plans for space shuttles and orbital stations were drawn up in Soviet design offices, but in the end personal disputes between designers and management prevented this.As for Lunar space program; USSR only had a program on automated spacecraft launches; with no manned spacecraft used; passing on the "Moon Race" part of Space Race.In the 1970s, specific proposals for the design of the space shuttle began to emerge, but shortcomings, especially in the electronics industry (rapid overheating of electronics), postponed the program until the end of the 1980s. The first shuttle, the Buran, flew in 1988, but without a human crew. Another shuttle, "Ptichka", eventually ended up under construction, as the shuttle project was canceled in 1991. For their launch into space, there is today an unused superpower rocket, Energia, which is the most powerful in the world.In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union managed to build the "Mir" orbital station. It was built on the construction of "Salyut" stations and its only role was civilian-grade research tasks. The Soviet Union adopted a command economy, whereby production and distribution of goods were centralized and directed by the government. The first Bolshevik experience with a command economy was the policy of War communism, which involved the nationalization of industry, centralized distribution of output, coercive requisition of agricultural production, and attempts to eliminate money circulation, private enterprises and free trade. After the severe economic collapse, Lenin replaced war communism by the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1921, legalizing free trade and private ownership of small businesses. The economy quickly recovered as a result.After a long debate among the members of the Politburo about the course of economic development, by 1928–1929, upon gaining control of the country, Stalin abandoned the NEP and pushed for full central planning, starting forced collectivization of agriculture and enacting draconian labor legislation. Resources were mobilized for rapid industrialization, which significantly expanded Soviet capacity in heavy industry and capital goods during the 1930s. The primary motivation for industrialization was preparation for war, mostly due to distrust of the outside capitalist world. As a result, the USSR was transformed from a largely agrarian economy into a great industrial power, leading the way for its emergence as a superpower after World War II. The war caused extensive devastation of the Soviet economy and infrastructure, which required massive reconstruction.By the early 1940s, the Soviet economy had become relatively self-sufficient; for most of the period until the creation of Comecon, only a tiny share of domestic products was traded internationally. After the creation of the Eastern Bloc, external trade rose rapidly. However, the influence of the world economy on the USSR was limited by fixed domestic prices and a state monopoly on foreign trade. Grain and sophisticated consumer manufactures became major import articles from around the 1960s. During the arms race of the Cold War, the Soviet economy was burdened by military expenditures, heavily lobbied for by a powerful bureaucracy dependent on the arms industry. At the same time, the USSR became the largest arms exporter to the Third World. Significant amounts of Soviet resources during the Cold War were allocated in aid to the other socialist states.From the 1930s until its dissolution in late 1991, the way the Soviet economy operated remained essentially unchanged. The economy was formally directed by central planning, carried out by Gosplan and organized in five-year plans. However, in practice, the plans were highly aggregated and provisional, subject to "ad hoc" intervention by superiors. All critical economic decisions were taken by the political leadership. Allocated resources and plan targets were usually denominated in rubles rather than in physical goods. Credit was discouraged, but widespread. The final allocation of output was achieved through relatively decentralized, unplanned contracting. Although in theory prices were legally set from above, in practice they were often negotiated, and informal horizontal links (e.g. between producer factories) were widespread.A number of basic services were state-funded, such as education and health care. In the manufacturing sector, heavy industry and defence were prioritized over consumer goods. Consumer goods, particularly outside large cities, were often scarce, of poor quality and limited variety. Under the command economy, consumers had almost no influence on production, and the changing demands of a population with growing incomes could not be satisfied by supplies at rigidly fixed prices. A massive unplanned second economy grew up at low levels alongside the planned one, providing some of the goods and services that the planners could not. The legalization of some elements of the decentralized economy was attempted with the reform of 1965.Although statistics of the Soviet economy are notoriously unreliable and its economic growth difficult to estimate precisely, by most accounts, the economy continued to expand until the mid-1980s. During the 1950s and 1960s, it had comparatively high growth and was catching up to the West. However, after 1970, the growth, while still positive, steadily declined much more quickly and consistently than in other countries, despite a rapid increase in the capital stock (the rate of capital increase was only surpassed by Japan).Overall, the growth rate of per capita income in the Soviet Union between 1960 and 1989 was slightly above the world average (based on 102 countries). According to Stanley Fischer and William Easterly, growth could have been faster. By their calculation, per capita income in 1989 should have been twice higher than it was, considering the amount of investment, education and population. The authors attribute this poor performance to the low productivity of capital. Steven Rosenfielde states that the standard of living declined due to Stalin's despotism. While there was a brief improvement after his death, it lapsed into stagnation.In 1987, Mikhail Gorbachev attempted to reform and revitalize the economy with his program of "perestroika". His policies relaxed state control over enterprises but did not replace it by market incentives, resulting in a sharp decline in output. The economy, already suffering from reduced petroleum export revenues, started to collapse. Prices were still fixed, and the property was still largely state-owned until after the country's dissolution. For most of the period after World War II until its collapse, Soviet GDP (PPP) was the second-largest in the world, and third during the second half of the 1980s, although on a per-capita basis, it was behind that of First World countries. Compared to countries with similar per-capita GDP in 1928, the Soviet Union experienced significant growth.In 1990, the country had a Human Development Index of 0.920, placing it in the "high" category of human development. It was the third-highest in the Eastern Bloc, behind Czechoslovakia and East Germany, and the 25th in the world of 130 countries.The need for fuel declined in the Soviet Union from the 1970s to the 1980s, both per ruble of gross social product and per ruble of industrial product. At the start, this decline grew very rapidly but gradually slowed down between 1970 and 1975. From 1975 and 1980, it grew even slower, only 2.6%. David Wilson, a historian, believed that the gas industry would account for 40% of Soviet fuel production by the end of the century. His theory did not come to fruition because of the USSR's collapse. The USSR, in theory, would have continued to have an economic growth rate of 2–2.5% during the 1990s because of Soviet energy fields. However, the energy sector faced many difficulties, among them the country's high military expenditure and hostile relations with the First World.In 1991, the Soviet Union had a pipeline network of for crude oil and another for natural gas. Petroleum and petroleum-based products, natural gas, metals, wood, agricultural products, and a variety of manufactured goods, primarily machinery, arms and military equipment, were exported. In the 1970s and 1980s, the USSR heavily relied on fossil fuel exports to earn hard currency. At its peak in 1988, it was the largest producer and second-largest exporter of crude oil, surpassed only by Saudi Arabia.The Soviet Union placed great emphasis on science and technology within its economy, however, the most remarkable Soviet successes in technology, such as producing the world's first space satellite, typically were the responsibility of the military. Lenin believed that the USSR would never overtake the developed world if it remained as technologically backward as it was upon its founding. Soviet authorities proved their commitment to Lenin's belief by developing massive networks, research and development organizations. In the early 1960s, the Soviets awarded 40% of chemistry PhDs to women, compared to only 5% in the United States. By 1989, Soviet scientists were among the world's best-trained specialists in several areas, such as energy physics, selected areas of medicine, mathematics, welding and military technologies. Due to rigid state planning and bureaucracy, the Soviets remained far behind technologically in chemistry, biology, and computers when compared to the First World.Under the Reagan administration, Project Socrates determined that the Soviet Union addressed the acquisition of science and technology in a manner that was radically different from what the US was using. In the case of the US, economic prioritization was being used for indigenous research and development as the means to acquire science and technology in both the private and public sectors. In contrast, the USSR was offensively and defensively maneuvering in the acquisition and utilization of the worldwide technology, to increase the competitive advantage that they acquired from the technology while preventing the US from acquiring a competitive advantage. However, technology-based planning was executed in a centralized, government-centric manner that greatly hindered its flexibility. This was exploited by the US to undermine the strength of the Soviet Union and thus foster its reform.Transport was a vital component of the country's economy. The economic centralization of the late 1920s and 1930s led to the development of infrastructure on a massive scale, most notably the establishment of Aeroflot, an aviation enterprise. The country had a wide variety of modes of transport by land, water and air. However, due to inadequate maintenance, much of the road, water and Soviet civil aviation transport were outdated and technologically backward compared to the First World.Soviet rail transport was the largest and most intensively used in the world; it was also better developed than most of its Western counterparts. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, Soviet economists were calling for the construction of more roads to alleviate some of the burdens from the railways and to improve the Soviet government budget. The street network and automotive industry remained underdeveloped, and dirt roads were common outside major cities. Soviet maintenance projects proved unable to take care of even the few roads the country had. By the early-to-mid-1980s, the Soviet authorities tried to solve the road problem by ordering the construction of new ones. Meanwhile, the automobile industry was growing at a faster rate than road construction. The underdeveloped road network led to a growing demand for public transport.Despite improvements, several aspects of the transport sector were still riddled with problems due to outdated infrastructure, lack of investment, corruption and bad decision-making. Soviet authorities were unable to meet the growing demand for transport infrastructure and services.The Soviet merchant navy was one of the largest in the world.Excess deaths throughout World War I and the Russian Civil War (including the postwar famine) amounted to a combined total of 18 million, some 10 million in the 1930s, and more than 26 million in 1941–5. The postwar Soviet population was 45 to 50 million smaller than it would have been if pre-war demographic growth had continued. According to Catherine Merridale, "... reasonable estimate would place the total number of excess deaths for the whole period somewhere around 60 million."The birth rate of the USSR decreased from 44.0 per thousand in 1926 to 18.0 in 1974, mainly due to increasing urbanization and the rising average age of marriages. The mortality rate demonstrated a gradual decrease as well – from 23.7 per thousand in 1926 to 8.7 in 1974. In general, the birth rates of the southern republics in Transcaucasia and Central Asia were considerably higher than those in the northern parts of the Soviet Union, and in some cases even increased in the post–World War II period, a phenomenon partly attributed to slower rates of urbanistion and traditionally earlier marriages in the southern republics. Soviet Europe moved towards sub-replacement fertility, while Soviet Central Asia continued to exhibit population growth well above replacement-level fertility.The late 1960s and the 1970s witnessed a reversal of the declining trajectory of the rate of mortality in the USSR, and was especially notable among men of working age, but was also prevalent in Russia and other predominantly Slavic areas of the country. An analysis of the official data from the late 1980s showed that after worsening in the late-1970s and the early 1980s, adult mortality began to improve again. The infant mortality rate increased from 24.7 in 1970 to 27.9 in 1974. Some researchers regarded the rise as mostly real, a consequence of worsening health conditions and services. The rises in both adult and infant mortality were not explained or defended by Soviet officials, and the Soviet government stopped publishing all mortality statistics for ten years. Soviet demographers and health specialists remained silent about the mortality increases until the late-1980s, when the publication of mortality data resumed, and researchers could delve into the real causes.Under Lenin, the state made explicit commitments to promote the equality of men and women. Many early Russian feminists and ordinary Russian working women actively participated in the Revolution, and many more were affected by the events of that period and the new policies. Beginning in October 1918, Lenin's government liberalized divorce and abortion laws, decriminalized homosexuality (re-criminalized in the 1930s), permitted cohabitation, and ushered in a host of reforms. However, without birth control, the new system produced many broken marriages, as well as countless out-of-wedlock children. The epidemic of divorces and extramarital affairs created social hardships when Soviet leaders wanted people to concentrate their efforts on growing the economy. Giving women control over their fertility also led to a precipitous decline in the birth rate, perceived as a threat to their country's military power. By 1936, Stalin reversed most of the liberal laws, ushering in a pronatalist era that lasted for decades.By 1917, Russia became the first great power to grant women the right to vote. After heavy casualties in World War I and II, women outnumbered men in Russia by a 4:3 ratio. This contributed to the larger role women played in Russian society compared to other great powers at the time.Anatoly Lunacharsky became the first People's Commissar for Education of Soviet Russia. In the beginning, the Soviet authorities placed great emphasis on the elimination of illiteracy. All left-handed children were forced to write with their right hand in the Soviet school system. Literate people were automatically hired as teachers. For a short period, quality was sacrificed for quantity. By 1940, Stalin could announce that illiteracy had been eliminated. Throughout the 1930s, social mobility rose sharply, which has been attributed to reforms in education. In the aftermath of World War II, the country's educational system expanded dramatically, which had a tremendous effect. In the 1960s, nearly all children had access to education, the only exception being those living in remote areas. Nikita Khrushchev tried to make education more accessible, making it clear to children that education was closely linked to the needs of society. Education also became important in giving rise to the New Man. Citizens directly entering the workforce had the constitutional right to a job and to free vocational training.The education system was highly centralized and universally accessible to all citizens, with affirmative action for applicants from nations associated with cultural backwardness. However, as part of the general antisemitic policy, an unofficial Jewish quota was applied in the leading institutions of higher education by subjecting Jewish applicants to harsher entrance examinations. The Brezhnev era also introduced a rule that required all university applicants to present a reference from the local Komsomol party secretary. According to statistics from 1986, the number of higher education students per the population of 10,000 was 181 for the USSR, compared to 517 for the US.The Soviet Union was an ethnically diverse country, with more than 100 distinct ethnic groups. The total population of the country was estimated at 293 million in 1991. According to a 1990 estimate, the majority of the population were Russians (50.78%), followed by Ukrainians (15.45%) and Uzbeks (5.84%).All citizens of the USSR had their own ethnic affiliation. The ethnicity of a person was chosen at the age of sixteen by the child's parents. If the parents did not agree, the child was automatically assigned the ethnicity of the father. Partly due to Soviet policies, some of the smaller minority ethnic groups were considered part of larger ones, such as the Mingrelians of Georgia, who were classified with the linguistically related Georgians. Some ethnic groups voluntarily assimilated, while others were brought in by force. Russians, Belarusians, and Ukrainians, who were all East Slavic and Orthodox, shared close cultural, ethnic, and religious ties, while other groups did not. With multiple nationalities living in the same territory, ethnic antagonisms developed over the years.Members of various ethnicities participated in legislative bodies. Organs of power like the Politburo, the Secretariat of the Central Committee etc., were formally ethnically neutral, but in reality, ethnic Russians were overrepresented, although there were also non-Russian leaders in the Soviet leadership, such as Joseph Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev, Nikolai Podgorny or Andrei Gromyko. During the Soviet era, a significant number of ethnic Russians and Ukrainians migrated to other Soviet republics, and many of them settled there. According to the last census in 1989, the Russian "diaspora" in the Soviet republics had reached 25 million.In 1917, before the revolution, health conditions were significantly behind those of developed countries. As Lenin later noted, "Either the lice will defeat socialism, or socialism will defeat the lice". The Soviet principle of health care was conceived by the People's Commissariat for Health in 1918. Health care was to be controlled by the state and would be provided to its citizens free of charge, a revolutionary concept at the time. Article 42 of the 1977 Soviet Constitution gave all citizens the right to health protection and free access to any health institutions in the USSR. Before Leonid Brezhnev became General Secretary, the Soviet healthcare system was held in high esteem by many foreign specialists. This changed, however, from Brezhnev's accession and Mikhail Gorbachev's tenure as leader, during which the health care system was heavily criticized for many basic faults, such as the quality of service and the unevenness in its provision. Minister of Health Yevgeniy Chazov, during the 19th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, while highlighting such successes as having the most doctors and hospitals in the world, recognized the system's areas for improvement and felt that billions of Soviet rubles were squandered. After the revolution, life expectancy for all age groups went up. This statistic in itself was seen by some that the socialist system was superior to the capitalist system. These improvements continued into the 1960s when statistics indicated that the life expectancy briefly surpassed that of the United States. Life expectancy started to decline in the 1970s, possibly because of alcohol abuse. At the same time, infant mortality began to rise. After 1974, the government stopped publishing statistics on the matter. This trend can be partly explained by the number of pregnancies rising drastically in the Asian part of the country where infant mortality was the highest while declining markedly in the more developed European part of the Soviet Union.Soviet dental technology and dental health were considered notoriously bad. In 1991, the average 35-year-old had 12 to 14 cavities, fillings or missing teeth. Toothpaste was often not available, and toothbrushes did not conform to standards of modern dentistry.Under Lenin, the government gave small language groups their own writing systems. The development of these writing systems was highly successful, even though some flaws were detected. During the later days of the USSR, countries with the same multilingual situation implemented similar policies. A serious problem when creating these writing systems was that the languages differed dialectally greatly from each other. When a language had been given a writing system and appeared in a notable publication, it would attain "official language" status. There were many minority languages which never received their own writing system; therefore, their speakers were forced to have a second language. There are examples where the government retreated from this policy, most notably under Stalin where education was discontinued in languages that were not widespread. These languages were then assimilated into another language, mostly Russian. During World War II, some minority languages were banned, and their speakers accused of collaborating with the enemy.As the most widely spoken of the Soviet Union's many languages, Russian "de facto" functioned as an official language, as the "language of interethnic communication" (), but only assumed the "de jure" status as the official national language in 1990.Christianity and Islam had the highest number of adherents among the religious citizens. Eastern Christianity predominated among Christians, with Russia's traditional Russian Orthodox Church being the largest Christian denomination. About 90% of the Soviet Union's Muslims were Sunnis, with Shias being concentrated in the Azerbaijan SSR. Smaller groups included Roman Catholics, Jews, Buddhists, and a variety of Protestant denominations (especially Baptists and Lutherans).Religious influence had been strong in the Russian Empire. The Russian Orthodox Church enjoyed a privileged status as the church of the monarchy and took part in carrying out official state functions. The immediate period following the establishment of the Soviet state included a struggle against the Orthodox Church, which the revolutionaries considered an ally of the former ruling classes.In Soviet law, the "freedom to hold religious services" was constitutionally guaranteed, although the ruling Communist Party regarded religion as incompatible with the Marxist spirit of scientific materialism. In practice, the Soviet system subscribed to a narrow interpretation of this right, and in fact utilized a range of official measures to discourage religion and curb the activities of religious groups.The 1918 Council of People's Commissars decree establishing the Russian SFSR as a secular state also decreed that "the teaching of religion in all [places] where subjects of general instruction are taught, is forbidden. Citizens may teach and may be taught religion privately." Among further restrictions, those adopted in 1929 included express prohibitions on a range of church activities, including meetings for organized Bible study. Both Christian and non-Christian establishments were shut down by the thousands in the 1920s and 1930s. By 1940, as many as 90% of the churches, synagogues, and mosques that had been operating in 1917 were closed.Under the doctrine of state atheism, a "government-sponsored program of forced conversion to atheism" was conducted. The government targeted religions based on state interests, and while most organized religions were never outlawed, religious property was confiscated, believers were harassed, and religion was ridiculed while atheism was propagated in schools. In 1925, the government founded the League of Militant Atheists to intensify the propaganda campaign. Accordingly, although personal expressions of religious faith were not explicitly banned, a strong sense of social stigma was imposed on them by the formal structures and mass media, and it was generally considered unacceptable for members of certain professions (teachers, state bureaucrats, soldiers) to be openly religious. While persecution accelerated following Stalin's rise to power, a revival of Orthodoxy was fostered by the government during World War II and the Soviet authorities sought to control the Russian Orthodox Church rather than liquidate it. During the first five years of Soviet power, the Bolsheviks executed 28 Russian Orthodox bishops and over 1,200 Russian Orthodox priests. Many others were imprisoned or exiled. Believers were harassed and persecuted. Most seminaries were closed, and the publication of most religious material was prohibited. By 1941, only 500 churches remained open out of about 54,000 in existence before World War I.Convinced that religious anti-Sovietism had become a thing of the past, and with the looming threat of war, the Stalin regime began shifting to a more moderate religion policy in the late 1930s. Soviet religious establishments overwhelmingly rallied to support the war effort during World War II. Amid other accommodations to religious faith after the German invasion, churches were reopened. Radio Moscow began broadcasting a religious hour, and a historic meeting between Stalin and Orthodox Church leader Patriarch Sergius of Moscow was held in 1943. Stalin had the support of the majority of the religious people in the USSR even through the late 1980s. The general tendency of this period was an increase in religious activity among believers of all faiths.Under Nikita Khrushchev, the state leadership clashed with the churches in 1958–1964, a period when atheism was emphasized in the educational curriculum, and numerous state publications promoted atheistic views. During this period, the number of churches fell from 20,000 to 10,000 from 1959 to 1965, and the number of synagogues dropped from 500 to 97. The number of working mosques also declined, falling from 1,500 to 500 within a decade.Religious institutions remained monitored by the Soviet government, but churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques were all given more leeway in the Brezhnev era. Official relations between the Orthodox Church and the government again warmed to the point that the Brezhnev government twice honored Orthodox Patriarch Alexy I with the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. A poll conducted by Soviet authorities in 1982 recorded 20% of the Soviet population as "active religious believers."The legacy of the USSR remains a controversial topic. The socio-economic nature of communist states such as the USSR, especially under Stalin, has also been much debated, varyingly being labelled a form of bureaucratic collectivism, state capitalism, state socialism, or a totally unique mode of production.The USSR implemented a broad range of policies over a long period of time, with a large amount of conflicting policies being implemented by different leaders. Some have a positive view of it whilst others are critical towards the country, calling it a repressive oligarchy. The opinions on the USSR are complex and have changed over time, with different generations having different views on the matter as well as on Soviet policies corresponding to separate time periods during its history. Leftists have largely varying views on the USSR. Whilst some leftists such as anarchists and other libertarian socialists, agree it did not give the workers control over the means of production and was a centralized oligarchy, others have more positive opinions as to the Bolshevik policies and Vladimir Lenin. Many anti-Stalinist leftists such as anarchists are extremely critical of Soviet authoritarianism and repression. Much of the criticism it receives is centered around massacres in the Soviet Union, the centralized hierarchy present in the USSR and mass political repression as well as violence towards government critics and political dissidents such as other leftists. Critics also point towards its failure to implement any substantial worker cooperatives or implementing worker liberation as well as corruption and the Soviet authoritarian nature.Many Russians and other former Soviet citizens have nostalgia for the USSR, pointing towards most infrastructure being built during Soviet times, increased job security, increased literacy rate, increased caloric intake and supposed ethnic pluralism enacted in the Soviet Union as well as political stability. The Russian Revolution is also seen in a positive light as well as the leadership of Lenin, Nikita Khrushchev and the later USSR, although many view Joseph Stalin's rule as positive for the country. In Armenia, 12% of respondents said the USSR collapse did good, while 66% said it did harm. In Kyrgyzstan, 16% of respondents said the collapse of the USSR did good, while 61% said it did harm. In a 2018 Rating Sociological Group poll, 47% of Ukrainian respondents had a positive opinion of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, who ruled the Soviet Union from 1964 to 1982. Much of the admiration of the USSR comes from the failings of the modern post-Soviet governments such as the control by oligarchs, corruption and outdated Soviet-era infrastructure as well as the rise and dominance of organised crime after the collapse of the USSR all directly leading into nostalgia for it.The 1941–45 period of World War II is still known in Russia as the "Great Patriotic War". The war became a topic of great importance in cinema, literature, history lessons at school, the mass media, and the arts. As a result of the massive losses suffered by the military and civilians during the conflict, Victory Day celebrated on 9 May is still one of the most important and emotional dates in Russia.In some post Soviet republics, there is a more negative view of the USSR, although there is no unanimity on the matter. In large part due to the Holodomor, ethnic Ukrainians have a negative view of it. Russian-speaking Ukrainians of Ukraine's southern and eastern regions have a more positive view of the USSR. In some countries with internal conflict, there is also nostalgia for the USSR, especially for refugees of the post-Soviet conflicts who have been forced to flee their homes and have been displaced. This nostalgia is less an admiration for the country or its policies than it is a longing to return to their homes and not to live in poverty. The many Russian enclaves in the former USSR republics such as Transnistria have in a general a positive remembrance of it.The left's view of the USSR is complex. While some leftists regard the USSR as an example of state capitalism or that it was an oligarchical state, other leftists admire Vladimir Lenin and the Russian Revolution.Council communists generally view the USSR as failing to create class consciousness, turning into a corrupt state in which the elite controlled society. Anarchists are critical of the country, labeling the Soviet system as "red fascism". Soviets actively destroyed anarchist organizations and anarchist communities, labeling anarchists as "enemies of the people". Factors contributing to the animosity towards the USSR included: the Soviet invasion of the anarchist Free Territory, the suppression of the anarchist Kronstadt rebellion and the response to the Norilsk uprising, in which prisoners created a radical system of government based on cooperatives and direct democracy in the Gulag. Anarchist organizations and unions were also banned during the Spanish Civil War under the Republican government by orders from the Soviet government. Due to this, anarchists generally hold a large animosity towards the USSR.The culture of the Soviet Union passed through several stages during the USSR's existence. During the first decade following the revolution, there was relative freedom and artists experimented with several different styles to find a distinctive Soviet style of art. Lenin wanted art to be accessible to the Russian people. On the other hand, hundreds of intellectuals, writers, and artists were exiled or executed, and their work banned, such as Nikolay Gumilyov who was shot for alleged conspiring against the Bolshevik regime, and Yevgeny Zamyatin.The government encouraged a variety of trends. In art and literature, numerous schools, some traditional and others radically experimental, proliferated. Communist writers Maxim Gorky and Vladimir Mayakovsky were active during this time. As a means of influencing a largely illiterate society, films received encouragement from the state, and much of director Sergei Eisenstein's best work dates from this period.During Stalin's rule, the Soviet culture was characterized by the rise and domination of the government-imposed style of socialist realism, with all other trends being severely repressed, with rare exceptions, such as Mikhail Bulgakov's works. Many writers were imprisoned and killed.Following the Khrushchev Thaw, censorship was diminished. During this time, a distinctive period of Soviet culture developed, characterized by conformist public life and an intense focus on personal life. Greater experimentation in art forms was again permissible, resulting in the production of more sophisticated and subtly critical work. The regime loosened its emphasis on socialist realism; thus, for instance, many protagonists of the novels of author Yury Trifonov concerned themselves with problems of daily life rather than with building socialism. Underground dissident literature, known as "samizdat", developed during this late period. In architecture, the Khrushchev era mostly focused on functional design as opposed to the highly decorated style of Stalin's epoch. In music, in response to the increasing popularity of forms of popular music like jazz in the West, many jazz orchestras were permitted throughout the USSR, notably the Melodiya Ensemble, named after the principle record label in the USSR.In the second half of the 1980s, Gorbachev's policies of "perestroika" and "glasnost" significantly expanded freedom of expression throughout the country in the media and the press.Founded on 20 July 1924 in Moscow, "Sovetsky Sport" was the first sports newspaper of the Soviet Union.The Soviet Olympic Committee formed on 21 April 1951, and the IOC recognized the new body in its 45th session. In the same year, when the Soviet representative Konstantin Andrianov became an IOC member, the USSR officially joined the Olympic Movement. The 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki thus became first Olympic Games for Soviet athletes. The Soviet Union was the biggest rival to the United States at the Summer Olympics, winning six of its nine appearances at the games and also topping the medal tally at the Winter Olympics six times. The Soviet Union's Olympics success has been attributed to its large investment in sports to demonstrate its superpower image and political influence on a global stage.The Soviet Union national ice hockey team won nearly every world championship and Olympic tournament between 1954 and 1991 and never failed to medal in any International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) tournament in which they competed.The advent of the state-sponsored "full-time amateur athlete" of the Eastern Bloc countries further eroded the ideology of the pure amateur, as it put the self-financed amateurs of the Western countries at a disadvantage. The Soviet Union entered teams of athletes who were all nominally students, soldiers, or working in a profession – in reality, the state paid many of these competitors to train on a full-time basis. Nevertheless, the IOC held to the traditional rules regarding amateurism.A 1989 report by a committee of the Australian Senate claimed that "there is hardly a medal winner at the Moscow Games, certainly not a gold medal winner...who is not on one sort of drug or another: usually several kinds. The Moscow Games might well have been called the Chemists' Games".A member of the IOC Medical Commission, Manfred Donike, privately ran additional tests with a new technique for identifying abnormal levels of testosterone by measuring its ratio to epitestosterone in urine. Twenty percent of the specimens he tested, including those from sixteen gold medalists, would have resulted in disciplinary proceedings had the tests been official. The results of Donike's unofficial tests later convinced the IOC to add his new technique to their testing protocols. The first documented case of "blood doping" occurred at the 1980 Summer Olympics when a runner was transfused with two pints of blood before winning medals in the 5000 m and 10,000 m.Documentation obtained in 2016 revealed the Soviet Union's plans for a statewide doping system in track and field in preparation for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Dated before the decision to boycott the 1984 Games, the document detailed the existing steroids operations of the program, along with suggestions for further enhancements. Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture prepared the communication, directed to the Soviet Union's head of track and field. Portugalov later became one of the leading figures involved in the implementation of Russian doping before the 2016 Summer Olympics.Official Soviet environmental policy has always attached great importance to actions in which human beings actively improve nature. Lenin's quote "Communism is Soviet power and electrification of the country!" in many respects summarizes the focus on modernization and industrial development. During the first five-year plan in 1928, Stalin proceeded to industrialize the country at all costs. Values such as environmental and nature protection have been completely ignored in the struggle to create a modern industrial society. After Stalin's death, they focused more on environmental issues, but the basic perception of the value of environmental protection remained the same.The Soviet media has always focused on the vast expanse of land and the virtually indestructible natural resources. This made it feel that contamination and uncontrolled exploitation of nature were not a problem. The Soviet state also firmly believed that scientific and technological progress would solve all the problems. Official ideology said that under socialism environmental problems could easily be overcome, unlike capitalist countries, where they seemingly could not be solved. The Soviet authorities had an almost unwavering belief that man could transcend nature. However, when the authorities had to admit that there were environmental problems in the USSR in the 1980s, they explained the problems in such a way that socialism had not yet been fully developed; pollution in a socialist society was only a temporary anomaly that would have been resolved if socialism had developed.The Chernobyl disaster in 1986 was the first major accident at a civilian nuclear power plant. Unparalleled in the world, it resulted in a large number of radioactive isotopes being released into the atmosphere. Radioactive doses have scattered relatively far. 4,000 new cases of thyroid cancer were reported after the incident, but this led to a relatively low number of deaths (WHO data, 2005). However, the long-term effects of the accident are unknown. Another major accident is the Kyshtym disaster.After the fall of the USSR, it was discovered that the environmental problems were greater than what the Soviet authorities admitted. The Kola Peninsula was one of the places with clear problems. Around the industrial cities of Monchegorsk and Norilsk, where nickel, for example, is mined, all forests have been destroyed by contamination, while the northern and other parts of Russia have been affected by emissions. During the 1990s, people in the West were also interested in the radioactive hazards of nuclear facilities, decommissioned nuclear submarines, and the processing of nuclear waste or spent nuclear fuel. It was also known in the early 1990s that the USSR had transported radioactive material to the Barents Sea and Kara Sea, which was later confirmed by the Russian parliament. The crash of the K-141 Kursk submarine in 2000 in the west further raised concerns. In the past, there were accidents involving submarines K-19, K-8, and K-129.
|
[
"Georgy Malenkov",
"Alexei Kosygin",
"Nikolai Ryzhkov",
"Joseph Stalin",
"Alexei Rykov",
"Ivan Silayev",
"Vladimir Lenin",
"Nikolai Bulganin",
"Nikolai Tikhonov",
"Vyacheslav Molotov",
"Valentin Pavlov"
] |
|
Who was the head of Soviet Union in 03/18/1959?
|
March 18, 1959
|
{
"text": [
"Nikita Khrushchev"
]
}
|
L2_Q15180_P6_6
|
Nikolai Bulganin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1955 to Mar, 1958.
Nikolai Tikhonov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1980 to Sep, 1985.
Ivan Silayev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1991 to Dec, 1991.
Alexei Kosygin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1964 to Oct, 1980.
Valentin Pavlov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jan, 1991 to Aug, 1991.
Nikolai Ryzhkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1985 to Jan, 1991.
Georgy Malenkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1953 to Feb, 1955.
Alexei Rykov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1924 to Dec, 1930.
Vyacheslav Molotov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Dec, 1930 to May, 1941.
Joseph Stalin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from May, 1941 to Mar, 1953.
Nikita Khrushchev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1958 to Oct, 1964.
Vladimir Lenin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jul, 1923 to Jan, 1924.
|
Soviet UnionThe Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a socialist state that spanned most of Europe and Asia during its existence from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a federal union of multiple national republics; in practice its government and economy were highly centralized until its final years. The country was a one-party state prior to 1990 governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with Moscow as its capital within its largest and most populous republic, the Russian SFSR. Other major urban centers were Leningrad (Russian SFSR), Kiev (Ukrainian SSR), Minsk (Byelorussian SSR), Tashkent (Uzbek SSR), Alma-Ata (Kazakh SSR) and Novosibirsk (Russian SFSR). It was the largest country in the world, covering over , and spanning eleven time zones. The Soviet Union's five biomes were tundra, taiga, steppes, desert, and mountains. Its diverse population was officially known as the Soviet people.The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 when the Bolsheviks, headed by Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Provisional Government that had earlier replaced the monarchy of the Russian Empire. They established the Russian Soviet Republic, beginning a civil war between the Bolshevik Red Army and many anti-Bolshevik forces across the former Empire, among whom the largest faction was the White Guard, which engaged in violent anti-communist repression against the Bolsheviks and their worker and peasant supporters known as the White Terror. The Red Army expanded and helped local Bolsheviks take power, establishing soviets, repressing their political opponents and rebellious peasants through Red Terror. By 1922, the Bolsheviks had emerged victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian republics. The New Economic Policy (NEP), which was introduced by Lenin, led to a partial return of a free market and private property; this resulted in a period of economic recovery.Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power. Stalin suppressed all political opposition to his rule inside the Communist Party and inaugurated a command economy. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and forced collectivization, which led to significant economic growth, but also led to a man-made famine in 1932–1933 and expanded the Gulag labour camp system originally established in 1918. Stalin also fomented political paranoia and conducted the Great Purge to remove his actual and perceived opponents from the Party through mass arrests of military leaders, Communist Party members, and ordinary citizens alike, who were then sent to correctional labor camps or sentenced to death.On 23 August 1939, after unsuccessful efforts to form an anti-fascist alliance with Western powers, the Soviets signed the non-aggression agreement with Nazi Germany. After the start of World War II, the formally neutral Soviets invaded and annexed territories of several Eastern European states, including eastern Poland and the Baltic states. In June 1941 the Germans invaded, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the cost of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at intense battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin and won World War II in Europe on 9 May 1945. The territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged in 1947 as a result of a post-war Soviet dominance in Eastern Europe, where the Eastern Bloc confronted the Western Bloc that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949.Following Stalin's death in 1953, a period known as de-Stalinization and the Khrushchev Thaw occurred under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev. The country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took an early lead in the Space Race with the first ever satellite and the first human spaceflight and the first probe to land on another planet, Venus. In the 1970s, there was a brief "détente" of relations with the United States, but tensions resumed when the Soviet Union deployed troops in Afghanistan in 1979. The war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters.In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to further reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of "glasnost" and "perestroika". The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing economic stagnation. The Cold War ended during his tenure and in 1989, Warsaw Pact countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective Marxist-Leninist regimes. Strong nationalist and separatist movements broke out across the USSR. Gorbachev initiated a referendum—boycotted by the Baltic republics, Armenia, Georgia, and Moldova—which resulted in the majority of participating citizens voting in favor of preserving the Union as a renewed federation. In August 1991, a coup d'état was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a high-profile role in facing down the coup. The main result was the banning of the Communist Party. The republics led by Russia and Ukraine declared independence. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned. All the republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states. The Russian Federation (formerly the Russian SFSR) assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations and is recognized as its continued legal personality in world affairs.The USSR produced many significant social and technological achievements and innovations regarding military power. It boasted the world's second-largest economy and the largest standing military in the world. The USSR was recognized as one of the five nuclear weapons states. It was a founding permanent member of the United Nations Security Council as well as a member of the OSCE, the WFTU and the leading member of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the Warsaw Pact.Before its dissolution, the USSR had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II. Sometimes also called "Soviet Empire", it exercised its hegemony in Eastern Europe and worldwide with military and economic strength, proxy conflicts and influence in developing countries and funding of scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The word "soviet" is derived from the Russian word "sovet" (), meaning "council", "assembly", "advice", ultimately deriving from the proto-Slavic verbal stem of "vět-iti" ("to inform"), related to Slavic "věst" ("news"), English "wise", the root in "ad-vis-or" (which came to English through French), or the Dutch "weten" ("to know"; cf. "wetenschap" meaning "science"). The word "sovietnik" means "councillor".Some organizations in Russian history were called "council" (). In the Russian Empire, the State Council which functioned from 1810 to 1917 was referred to as a Council of Ministers after the revolt of 1905.During the Georgian Affair, Vladimir Lenin envisioned an expression of Great Russian ethnic chauvinism by Joseph Stalin and his supporters, calling for these nation-states to join Russia as semi-independent parts of a greater union which he initially named as the Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia (). Stalin initially resisted the proposal but ultimately accepted it, although with Lenin's agreement changed the name to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), albeit all the republics began as "socialist soviet" and did not change to the other order until 1936. In addition, in the national languages of several republics, the word "council" or "conciliar" in the respective language was only quite late changed to an adaptation of the Russian "soviet" and never in others, e.g. Ukraine."СССР" (in Latin alphabet: "SSSR") is the abbreviation of USSR in Russian. It is written in Cyrillic letters. The Soviets used the Cyrillic abbreviation so frequently that audiences worldwide became familiar with its meaning. Notably, both Cyrillic letters used have homoglyphic (but transliterally distinct) letters in Latin alphabets. Because of widespread familiarity with the Cyrillic abbreviation, Latin alphabet users in particular almost always use the Latin homoglyphs "C" and "P" (as opposed to the transliteral Latin letters "S" and "R") when rendering the USSR's native abbreviation.After "СССР", the most common short form names for the Soviet state in Russian were "Советский Союз" (transliteration: "Sovetskiy Soyuz") which literally means "Soviet Union", and also "Союз ССР" (transliteration: "Soyuz SSR") which, after compensating for grammatical differences, essentially translates to "Union of SSR's" in English.In the English language media, the state was referred to as the Soviet Union or the USSR. In other European languages, the locally translated short forms and abbreviations are usually used such as "Union soviétique" and "URSS" in French, or "Sowjetunion" and "UdSSR" in German. In the English-speaking world, the Soviet Union was also informally called Russia and its citizens Russians, although that was technically incorrect since Russia was only one of the republics. Such misapplications of the linguistic equivalents to the term "Russia" and its derivatives were frequent in other languages as well.The Soviet Union covered an area of over , and was the world's largest country, a status that is retained by its successor state, Russia. It covered a sixth of Earth's land surface, and its size was comparable to the continent of North America. Its western part in Europe accounted for a quarter of the country's area and was the cultural and economic center. The eastern part in Asia extended to the Pacific Ocean to the east and Afghanistan to the south, and, except some areas in Central Asia, was much less populous. It spanned over east to west across eleven time zones, and over north to south. It had five climate zones: tundra, taiga, steppes, desert and mountains.The Soviet Union, similarly to Russia, had the world's longest border, measuring over , or circumferences of Earth. Two-thirds of it was a coastline. The country bordered Afghanistan, China, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Hungary, Iran, Mongolia, North Korea, Norway, Poland, Romania, and Turkey from 1945 to 1991. The Bering Strait separated the country from the United States, while the La Pérouse Strait separated it from Japan.The Soviet Union's highest mountain was Communism Peak (now Ismoil Somoni Peak) in Tajik SSR, at . It also included most of the world's largest lakes; the Caspian Sea (shared with Iran), and Lake Baikal in Russia, the world's largest and deepest freshwater lake.Modern revolutionary activity in the Russian Empire began with the 1825 Decembrist revolt. Although serfdom was abolished in 1861, it was done on terms unfavorable to the peasants and served to encourage revolutionaries. A parliament—the State Duma—was established in 1906 after the Russian Revolution of 1905, but Tsar Nicholas II resisted attempts to move from absolute to a constitutional monarchy. Social unrest continued and was aggravated during World War I by military defeat and food shortages in major cities.A spontaneous popular uprising in Petrograd, in response to the wartime decay of Russia's economy and morale, culminated in the February Revolution and the toppling of Nicholas II and the imperial government in March 1917. The tsarist autocracy was replaced by the Russian Provisional Government, which intended to conduct elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly and to continue fighting on the side of the Entente in World War I.At the same time, workers' councils, known in Russian as "Soviets", sprang up across the country. The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, pushed for socialist revolution in the Soviets and on the streets. On 7 November 1917, the Red Guards stormed the Winter Palace in Petrograd, ending the rule of the Provisional Government and leaving all political power to the Soviets. This event would later be officially known in Soviet bibliographies as the Great October Socialist Revolution. In December, the Bolsheviks signed an armistice with the Central Powers, though by February 1918, fighting had resumed. In March, the Soviets ended involvement in the war and signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.A long and bloody Civil War ensued between the Reds and the Whites, starting in 1917 and ending in 1923 with the Reds' victory. It included foreign intervention, the execution of the former tsar and his family, and the famine of 1921, which killed about five million people. In March 1921, during a related conflict with Poland, the Peace of Riga was signed, splitting disputed territories in Belarus and Ukraine between the Republic of Poland and Soviet Russia. Soviet Russia had to resolve similar conflicts with the newly established republics of Estonia, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania.On 28 December 1922, a conference of plenipotentiary delegations from the Russian SFSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR approved the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and the Declaration of the Creation of the USSR, forming the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. These two documents were confirmed by the first Congress of Soviets of the USSR and signed by the heads of the delegations, Mikhail Kalinin, Mikhail Tskhakaya, Mikhail Frunze, Grigory Petrovsky, and Alexander Chervyakov, on 30 December 1922. The formal proclamation was made from the stage of the Bolshoi Theatre.An intensive restructuring of the economy, industry and politics of the country began in the early days of Soviet power in 1917. A large part of this was done according to the Bolshevik Initial Decrees, government documents signed by Vladimir Lenin. One of the most prominent breakthroughs was the GOELRO plan, which envisioned a major restructuring of the Soviet economy based on total electrification of the country. The plan became the prototype for subsequent Five-Year Plans and was fulfilled by 1931. After the economic policy of "War communism" during the Russian Civil War, as a prelude to fully developing socialism in the country, the Soviet government permitted some private enterprise to coexist alongside nationalized industry in the 1920s, and total food requisition in the countryside was replaced by a food tax.From its creation, the government in the Soviet Union was based on the one-party rule of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks). The stated purpose was to prevent the return of capitalist exploitation, and that the principles of democratic centralism would be the most effective in representing the people's will in a practical manner. The debate over the future of the economy provided the background for a power struggle in the years after Lenin's death in 1924. Initially, Lenin was to be replaced by a "troika" consisting of Grigory Zinoviev of the Ukrainian SSR, Lev Kamenev of the Russian SFSR, and Joseph Stalin of the Transcaucasian SFSR.On 1 February 1924, the USSR was recognized by the United Kingdom. The same year, a Soviet Constitution was approved, legitimizing the December 1922 union. According to Archie Brown the constitution was never an accurate guide to political reality in the USSR. For example the fact that the Party played the leading role in making and enforcing policy was not mentioned in it until 1977. The USSR was a federative entity of many constituent republics, each with its own political and administrative entities. However, the term "Soviet Russia"strictly applicable only to the Russian Federative Socialist Republicwas often applied to the entire country by non-Soviet writers.On 3 April 1922, Stalin was named the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Lenin had appointed Stalin the head of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate, which gave Stalin considerable power. By gradually consolidating his influence and isolating and outmanoeuvring his rivals within the party, Stalin became the undisputed leader of the country and, by the end of the 1920s, established a totalitarian rule. In October 1927, Zinoviev and Leon Trotsky were expelled from the Central Committee and forced into exile.In 1928, Stalin introduced the first five-year plan for building a socialist economy. In place of the internationalism expressed by Lenin throughout the Revolution, it aimed to build Socialism in One Country. In industry, the state assumed control over all existing enterprises and undertook an intensive program of industrialization. In agriculture, rather than adhering to the "lead by example" policy advocated by Lenin, forced collectivization of farms was implemented all over the country.Famines ensued as a result, causing deaths estimated at three to seven million; surviving kulaks were persecuted, and many were sent to Gulags to do forced labor. Social upheaval continued in the mid-1930s. Despite the turmoil of the mid-to-late 1930s, the country developed a robust industrial economy in the years preceding World War II.Closer cooperation between the USSR and the West developed in the early 1930s. From 1932 to 1934, the country participated in the World Disarmament Conference. In 1933, diplomatic relations between the United States and the USSR were established when in November, the newly elected President of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, chose to recognize Stalin's Communist government formally and negotiated a new trade agreement between the two countries. In September 1934, the country joined the League of Nations. After the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, the USSR actively supported the Republican forces against the Nationalists, who were supported by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany.In December 1936, Stalin unveiled a new constitution that was praised by supporters around the world as the most democratic constitution imaginable, though there was some skepticism. Stalin's Great Purge resulted in the detainment or execution of many "Old Bolsheviks" who had participated in the October Revolution with Lenin. According to declassified Soviet archives, the NKVD arrested more than one and a half million people in 1937 and 1938, of whom 681,692 were shot. Over those two years, there were an average of over one thousand executions a day.In 1939, after attempts to form a military alliance with Britain and France against Germany failed, the Soviet Union made a dramatic shift towards Nazi Germany. Almost a year after Britain and France had concluded the Munich Agreement with Germany, the Soviet Union made agreements with Germany as well, both militarily and economically during extensive talks. The two countries concluded the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and the German–Soviet Commercial Agreement in August 1939. The former made possible the Soviet occupation of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bessarabia, northern Bukovina, and eastern Poland, while the Soviets remained formally neutral. In late November, unable to coerce the Republic of Finland by diplomatic means into moving its border back from Leningrad, Stalin ordered the invasion of Finland. In the east, the Soviet military won several decisive victories during border clashes with the Empire of Japan in 1938 and 1939. However, in April 1941, the USSR signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact with Japan, recognizing the territorial integrity of Manchukuo, a Japanese puppet state.Germany broke the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 starting what was known in the USSR as the Great Patriotic War. The Red Army stopped the seemingly invincible German Army at the Battle of Moscow. The Battle of Stalingrad, which lasted from late 1942 to early 1943, dealt a severe blow to Germany from which they never fully recovered and became a turning point in the war. After Stalingrad, Soviet forces drove through Eastern Europe to Berlin before Germany surrendered in 1945. The German Army suffered 80% of its military deaths in the Eastern Front. Harry Hopkins, a close foreign policy advisor to Franklin D. Roosevelt, spoke on 10 August 1943 of the USSR's decisive role in the war.In the same year, the USSR, in fulfilment of its agreement with the Allies at the Yalta Conference, denounced the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1945 and invaded Manchukuo and other Japan-controlled territories on 9 August 1945. This conflict ended with a decisive Soviet victory, contributing to the unconditional surrender of Japan and the end of World War II.The USSR suffered greatly in the war, losing around 27 million people. Approximately 2.8 million Soviet POWs died of starvation, mistreatment, or executions in just eight months of 1941–42. During the war, the country together with the United States, the United Kingdom and China were considered the Big Four Allied powers, and later became the Four Policemen that formed the basis of the United Nations Security Council. It emerged as a superpower in the post-war period. Once denied diplomatic recognition by the Western world, the USSR had official relations with practically every country by the late 1940s. A member of the United Nations at its foundation in 1945, the country became one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, which gave it the right to veto any of its resolutions.During the immediate post-war period, the Soviet Union rebuilt and expanded its economy, while maintaining its strictly centralized control. It took effective control over most of the countries of Eastern Europe (except Yugoslavia and later Albania), turning them into satellite states. The USSR bound its satellite states in a military alliance, the Warsaw Pact, in 1955, and an economic organization, Council for Mutual Economic Assistance or Comecon, a counterpart to the European Economic Community (EEC), from 1949 to 1991. The USSR concentrated on its own recovery, seizing and transferring most of Germany's industrial plants, and it exacted war reparations from East Germany, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria using Soviet-dominated joint enterprises. It also instituted trading arrangements deliberately designed to favor the country. Moscow controlled the Communist parties that ruled the satellite states, and they followed orders from the Kremlin. Later, the Comecon supplied aid to the eventually victorious Communist Party of China, and its influence grew elsewhere in the world. Fearing its ambitions, the Soviet Union's wartime allies, the United Kingdom and the United States, became its enemies. In the ensuing Cold War, the two sides clashed indirectly in proxy wars.Stalin died on 5 March 1953. Without a mutually agreeable successor, the highest Communist Party officials initially opted to rule the Soviet Union jointly through a troika headed by Georgy Malenkov. This did not last, however, and Nikita Khrushchev eventually won the ensuing power struggle by the mid-1950s. In 1956, he denounced Joseph Stalin and proceeded to ease controls over the party and society. This was known as de-Stalinization.Moscow considered Eastern Europe to be a critically vital buffer zone for the forward defence of its western borders, in case of another major invasion such as the German invasion of 1941. For this reason, the USSR sought to cement its control of the region by transforming the Eastern European countries into satellite states, dependent upon and subservient to its leadership. As a result, Soviet military forces were used to suppress an anti-communist uprising in Hungary in 1956.In the late 1950s, a confrontation with China regarding the Soviet rapprochement with the West, and what Mao Zedong perceived as Khrushchev's revisionism, led to the Sino–Soviet split. This resulted in a break throughout the global Marxist–Leninist movement, with the governments in Albania, Cambodia and Somalia choosing to ally with China.During this period of the late 1950s and early 1960s, the USSR continued to realize scientific and technological exploits in the Space Race, rivaling the United States: launching the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1 in 1957; a living dog named Laika in 1957; the first human being, Yuri Gagarin in 1961; the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova in 1963; Alexei Leonov, the first person to walk in space in 1965; the first soft landing on the Moon by spacecraft Luna 9 in 1966; and the first Moon rovers, Lunokhod 1 and Lunokhod 2.Khrushchev initiated "The Thaw", a complex shift in political, cultural and economic life in the country. This included some openness and contact with other nations and new social and economic policies with more emphasis on commodity goods, allowing a dramatic rise in living standards while maintaining high levels of economic growth. Censorship was relaxed as well. Khrushchev's reforms in agriculture and administration, however, were generally unproductive. In 1962, he precipitated a crisis with the United States over the Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles in Cuba. An agreement was made with the United States to remove nuclear missiles from both Cuba and Turkey, concluding the crisis. This event caused Khrushchev much embarrassment and loss of prestige, resulting in his removal from power in 1964.Following the ousting of Khrushchev, another period of collective leadership ensued, consisting of Leonid Brezhnev as General Secretary, Alexei Kosygin as Premier and Nikolai Podgorny as Chairman of the Presidium, lasting until Brezhnev established himself in the early 1970s as the preeminent Soviet leader.In 1968, the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact allies invaded Czechoslovakia to halt the Prague Spring reforms. In the aftermath, Brezhnev justified the invasion and previous military interventions as well as any potential military interventions in the future by introducing the Brezhnev Doctrine, which proclaimed any threat to socialist rule in a Warsaw Pact state as a threat to all Warsaw Pact states, therefore justifying military intervention.Brezhnev presided throughout "détente" with the West that resulted in treaties on armament control (SALT I, SALT II, Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty) while at the same time building up Soviet military might.In October 1977, the third Soviet Constitution was unanimously adopted. The prevailing mood of the Soviet leadership at the time of Brezhnev's death in 1982 was one of aversion to change. The long period of Brezhnev's rule had come to be dubbed one of "standstill", with an ageing and ossified top political leadership. This period is also known as the Era of Stagnation, a period of adverse economic, political, and social effects in the country, which began during the rule of Brezhnev and continued under his successors Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko.In late 1979, the Soviet Union's military intervened in the ongoing civil war in neighboring Afghanistan, effectively ending a détente with the West.Two developments dominated the decade that followed: the increasingly apparent crumbling of the Soviet Union's economic and political structures, and the patchwork attempts at reforms to reverse that process. Kenneth S. Deffeyes argued in "Beyond Oil" that the Reagan administration encouraged Saudi Arabia to lower the price of oil to the point where the Soviets could not make a profit selling their oil, and resulted in the depletion of the country's hard currency reserves.Brezhnev's next two successors, transitional figures with deep roots in his tradition, did not last long. Yuri Andropov was 68 years old and Konstantin Chernenko 72 when they assumed power; both died in less than two years. In an attempt to avoid a third short-lived leader, in 1985, the Soviets turned to the next generation and selected Mikhail Gorbachev. He made significant changes in the economy and party leadership, called "perestroika". His policy of "glasnost" freed public access to information after decades of heavy government censorship. Gorbachev also moved to end the Cold War. In 1988, the USSR abandoned its war in Afghanistan and began to withdraw its forces. In the following year, Gorbachev refused to interfere in the internal affairs of the Soviet satellite states, which paved the way for the Revolutions of 1989. In particular, the standstill of the Soviet Union at the Pan-European Picnic in August 1989 then set a peaceful chain reaction in motion at the end of which the Eastern Bloc collapsed. With the tearing down of the Berlin Wall and with East and West Germany pursuing unification, the Iron Curtain between the West and Soviet-controlled regions came down.At the same time, the Soviet republics started legal moves towards potentially declaring sovereignty over their territories, citing the freedom to secede in Article 72 of the USSR constitution. On 7 April 1990, a law was passed allowing a republic to secede if more than two-thirds of its residents voted for it in a referendum. Many held their first free elections in the Soviet era for their own national legislatures in 1990. Many of these legislatures proceeded to produce legislation contradicting the Union laws in what was known as the "War of Laws". In 1989, the Russian SFSR convened a newly elected Congress of People's Deputies. Boris Yeltsin was elected its chairman. On 12 June 1990, the Congress declared Russia's sovereignty over its territory and proceeded to pass laws that attempted to supersede some of the Soviet laws. After a landslide victory of Sąjūdis in Lithuania, that country declared its independence restored on 11 March 1990.A referendum for the preservation of the USSR was held on 17 March 1991 in nine republics (the remainder having boycotted the vote), with the majority of the population in those republics voting for preservation of the Union. The referendum gave Gorbachev a minor boost. In the summer of 1991, the New Union Treaty, which would have turned the country into a much looser Union, was agreed upon by eight republics. The signing of the treaty, however, was interrupted by the August Coup—an attempted coup d'état by hardline members of the government and the KGB who sought to reverse Gorbachev's reforms and reassert the central government's control over the republics. After the coup collapsed, Yeltsin was seen as a hero for his decisive actions, while Gorbachev's power was effectively ended. The balance of power tipped significantly towards the republics. In August 1991, Latvia and Estonia immediately declared the restoration of their full independence (following Lithuania's 1990 example). Gorbachev resigned as general secretary in late August, and soon afterwards, the party's activities were indefinitely suspended—effectively ending its rule. By the fall, Gorbachev could no longer influence events outside Moscow, and he was being challenged even there by Yeltsin, who had been elected President of Russia in July 1991.The remaining 12 republics continued discussing new, increasingly looser, models of the Union. However, by December all except Russia and Kazakhstan had formally declared independence. During this time, Yeltsin took over what remained of the Soviet government, including the Moscow Kremlin. The final blow was struck on 1 December when Ukraine, the second-most powerful republic, voted overwhelmingly for independence. Ukraine's secession ended any realistic chance of the country staying together even on a limited scale.On 8 December 1991, the presidents of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus (formerly Byelorussia), signed the Belavezha Accords, which declared the Soviet Union dissolved and established the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in its place. While doubts remained over the authority of the accords to do this, on 21 December 1991, the representatives of all Soviet republics except Georgia signed the Alma-Ata Protocol, which confirmed the accords. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned as the President of the USSR, declaring the office extinct. He turned the powers that had been vested in the presidency over to Yeltsin. That night, the Soviet flag was lowered for the last time, and the Russian tricolor was raised in its place.The following day, the Supreme Soviet, the highest governmental body, voted both itself and the country out of existence. This is generally recognized as marking the official, final dissolution of the Soviet Union as a functioning state, and the end of the Cold War. The Soviet Army initially remained under overall CIS command but was soon absorbed into the different military forces of the newly independent states. The few remaining Soviet institutions that had not been taken over by Russia ceased to function by the end of 1991.Following the dissolution, Russia was internationally recognized as its legal successor on the international stage. To that end, Russia voluntarily accepted all Soviet foreign debt and claimed Soviet overseas properties as its own. Under the 1992 Lisbon Protocol, Russia also agreed to receive all nuclear weapons remaining in the territory of other former Soviet republics. Since then, the Russian Federation has assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations. Ukraine has refused to recognize exclusive Russian claims to succession of the USSR and claimed such status for Ukraine as well, which was codified in Articles 7 and 8 of its 1991 law On Legal Succession of Ukraine. Since its independence in 1991, Ukraine has continued to pursue claims against Russia in foreign courts, seeking to recover its share of the foreign property that was owned by the USSR.The dissolution was followed by a severe drop in economic and social conditions in post-Soviet states, including a rapid increase in poverty, crime, corruption, unemployment, homelessness, rates of disease, infant mortality and domestic violence, as well as demographic losses and income inequality and the rise of an oligarchical class, along with decreases in calorie intake, life expectancy, adult literacy, and income. Between 1988–1989 and 1993–1995, the Gini ratio increased by an average of 9 points for all former socialist countries. The economic shocks that accompanied wholesale privatization were associated with sharp increases in mortality. Data shows Russia, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia saw a tripling of unemployment and a 42% increase in male death rates between 1991 and 1994. In the following decades, only five or six of the post-communist states are on a path to joining the wealthy capitalist West while most are falling behind, some to such an extent that it will take over fifty years to catch up to where they were before the fall of the Soviet Bloc.In summing up the international ramifications of these events, Vladislav Zubok stated: "The collapse of the Soviet empire was an event of epochal geopolitical, military, ideological, and economic significance." Before the dissolution, the country had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, military strength, economic strength, aid to developing countries, and scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The analysis of the succession of states for the 15 post-Soviet states is complex. The Russian Federation is seen as the legal "continuator" state and is for most purposes the heir to the Soviet Union. It retained ownership of all former Soviet embassy properties, as well as the old Soviet UN membership and permanent membership on the Security Council.Of the two other co-founding states of the USSR at the time of the dissolution, Ukraine was the only one that had passed laws, similar to Russia, that it is a state-successor of both the Ukrainian SSR and the USSR. Soviet treaties laid groundwork for Ukraine's future foreign agreements as well as they led to Ukraine agreeing to undertake 16.37% of debts of the Soviet Union for which it was going to receive its share of USSR's foreign property. Although it had a tough position at the time, due to Russia's position as a "single continuation of the USSR" that became widely accepted in the West as well as a constant pressure from the Western countries, allowed Russia to dispose state property of USSR abroad and conceal information about it. Due to that Ukraine never ratified "zero option" agreement that Russian Federation had signed with other former Soviet republics, as it denied disclosing of information about Soviet Gold Reserves and its Diamond Fund. The dispute over former Soviet property and assets between the two former republics is still ongoing:Similar situation occurred with restitution of cultural property. Although on 14 February 1992 Russia and other former Soviet republics signed agreement "On the return of cultural and historic property to the origin states" in Minsk, it was halted by Russian State Duma that had eventually passed "Federal Law on Cultural Valuables Displaced to the USSR as a Result of the Second World War and Located on the Territory of the Russian Federation" which made restitution currently impossible.There are additionally four states that claim independence from the other internationally recognised post-Soviet states but possess limited international recognition: Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia and Transnistria. The Chechen separatist movement of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria lacks any international recognition.During his rule, Stalin always made the final policy decisions. Otherwise, Soviet foreign policy was set by the commission on the Foreign Policy of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, or by the party's highest body the Politburo. Operations were handled by the separate Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It was known as the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (or Narkomindel), until 1946. The most influential spokesmen were Georgy Chicherin (1872–1936), Maxim Litvinov (1876–1951), Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986), Andrey Vyshinsky (1883–1954) and Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989). Intellectuals were based in the Moscow State Institute of International Relations.The Marxist-Leninist leadership of the Soviet Union intensely debated foreign policy issues and change directions several times. Even after Stalin assumed dictatorial control in the late 1920s, there were debates, and he frequently changed positions.During the country's early period, it was assumed that Communist revolutions would break out soon in every major industrial country, and it was the Soviet responsibility to assist them. The Comintern was the weapon of choice. A few revolutions did break out, but they were quickly suppressed (the longest lasting one was in Hungary)—the Hungarian Soviet Republic—lasted only from 21 March 1919 to 1 August 1919. The Russian Bolsheviks were in no position to give any help.By 1921, Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin realized that capitalism had stabilized itself in Europe and there would not be any widespread revolutions anytime soon. It became the duty of the Russian Bolsheviks to protect what they had in Russia, and avoid military confrontations that might destroy their bridgehead. Russia was now a pariah state, along with Germany. The two came to terms in 1922 with the Treaty of Rapallo that settled long-standing grievances. At the same time, the two countries secretly set up training programs for the illegal German army and air force operations at hidden camps in the USSR.Moscow eventually stopped threatening other states, and instead worked to open peaceful relationships in terms of trade, and diplomatic recognition. The United Kingdom dismissed the warnings of Winston Churchill and a few others about a continuing Marxist-Leninist threat, and opened trade relations and "de facto" diplomatic recognition in 1922. There was hope for a settlement of the pre-war Tsarist debts, but it was repeatedly postponed. Formal recognition came when the new Labour Party came to power in 1924. All the other countries followed suit in opening trade relations. Henry Ford opened large-scale business relations with the Soviets in the late 1920s, hoping that it would lead to long-term peace. Finally, in 1933, the United States officially recognized the USSR, a decision backed by the public opinion and especially by US business interests that expected an opening of a new profitable market.In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Stalin ordered Marxist-Leninist parties across the world to strongly oppose non-Marxist political parties, labor unions or other organizations on the left. Stalin reversed himself in 1934 with the Popular Front program that called on all Marxist parties to join together with all anti-Fascist political, labor, and organizational forces that were opposed to fascism, especially of the Nazi variety.In 1939, half a year after the Munich Agreement, the USSR attempted to form an anti-Nazi alliance with France and Britain. Adolf Hitler proposed a better deal, which would give the USSR control over much of Eastern Europe through the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In September, Germany invaded Poland, and the USSR also invaded later that month, resulting in the partition of Poland. In response, Britain and France declared war on Germany, marking the beginning of World War II.There were three power hierarchies in the Soviet Union: the legislature represented by the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, the government represented by the Council of Ministers, and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), the only legal party and the final policymaker in the country.At the top of the Communist Party was the Central Committee, elected at Party Congresses and Conferences. In turn, the Central Committee voted for a Politburo (called the Presidium between 1952 and 1966), Secretariat and the General Secretary (First Secretary from 1953 to 1966), the "de facto" highest office in the Soviet Union. Depending on the degree of power consolidation, it was either the Politburo as a collective body or the General Secretary, who always was one of the Politburo members, that effectively led the party and the country (except for the period of the highly personalized authority of Stalin, exercised directly through his position in the Council of Ministers rather than the Politburo after 1941). They were not controlled by the general party membership, as the key principle of the party organization was democratic centralism, demanding strict subordination to higher bodies, and elections went uncontested, endorsing the candidates proposed from above.The Communist Party maintained its dominance over the state mainly through its control over the system of appointments. All senior government officials and most deputies of the Supreme Soviet were members of the CPSU. Of the party heads themselves, Stalin (1941–1953) and Khrushchev (1958–1964) were Premiers. Upon the forced retirement of Khrushchev, the party leader was prohibited from this kind of double membership, but the later General Secretaries for at least some part of their tenure occupied the mostly ceremonial position of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, the nominal head of state. The institutions at lower levels were overseen and at times supplanted by primary party organizations.However, in practice the degree of control the party was able to exercise over the state bureaucracy, particularly after the death of Stalin, was far from total, with the bureaucracy pursuing different interests that were at times in conflict with the party. Nor was the party itself monolithic from top to bottom, although factions were officially banned.The Supreme Soviet (successor of the Congress of Soviets) was nominally the highest state body for most of the Soviet history, at first acting as a rubber stamp institution, approving and implementing all decisions made by the party. However, its powers and functions were extended in the late 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, including the creation of new state commissions and committees. It gained additional powers relating to the approval of the Five-Year Plans and the government budget. The Supreme Soviet elected a Presidium (successor of the Central Executive Committee) to wield its power between plenary sessions, ordinarily held twice a year, and appointed the Supreme Court, the Procurator General and the Council of Ministers (known before 1946 as the Council of People's Commissars), headed by the Chairman (Premier) and managing an enormous bureaucracy responsible for the administration of the economy and society. State and party structures of the constituent republics largely emulated the structure of the central institutions, although the Russian SFSR, unlike the other constituent republics, for most of its history had no republican branch of the CPSU, being ruled directly by the union-wide party until 1990. Local authorities were organized likewise into party committees, local Soviets and executive committees. While the state system was nominally federal, the party was unitary.The state security police (the KGB and ) played an important role in Soviet politics. It was instrumental in the Great Purge, but was brought under strict party control after Stalin's death. Under Yuri Andropov, the KGB engaged in the suppression of political dissent and maintained an extensive network of informers, reasserting itself as a political actor to some extent independent of the party-state structure, culminating in the anti-corruption campaign targeting high-ranking party officials in the late 1970s and early 1980s.The constitution, which was promulgated in 1924, 1936 and 1977, did not limit state power. No formal separation of powers existed between the Party, Supreme Soviet and Council of Ministers that represented executive and legislative branches of the government. The system was governed less by statute than by informal conventions, and no settled mechanism of leadership succession existed. Bitter and at times deadly power struggles took place in the Politburo after the deaths of Lenin and Stalin, as well as after Khrushchev's dismissal, itself due to a decision by both the Politburo and the Central Committee. All leaders of the Communist Party before Gorbachev died in office, except Georgy Malenkov and Khrushchev, both dismissed from the party leadership amid internal struggle within the party.Between 1988 and 1990, facing considerable opposition, Mikhail Gorbachev enacted reforms shifting power away from the highest bodies of the party and making the Supreme Soviet less dependent on them. The Congress of People's Deputies was established, the majority of whose members were directly elected in competitive elections held in March 1989. The Congress now elected the Supreme Soviet, which became a full-time parliament, and much stronger than before. For the first time since the 1920s, it refused to rubber stamp proposals from the party and Council of Ministers. In 1990, Gorbachev introduced and assumed the position of the President of the Soviet Union, concentrated power in his executive office, independent of the party, and subordinated the government, now renamed the Cabinet of Ministers of the USSR, to himself.Tensions grew between the Union-wide authorities under Gorbachev, reformists led in Russia by Boris Yeltsin and controlling the newly elected Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR, and communist hardliners. On 19–21 August 1991, a group of hardliners staged a coup attempt. The coup failed, and the State Council of the Soviet Union became the highest organ of state power "in the period of transition". Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary, only remaining President for the final months of the existence of the USSR.The judiciary was not independent of the other branches of government. The Supreme Court supervised the lower courts (People's Court) and applied the law as established by the constitution or as interpreted by the Supreme Soviet. The Constitutional Oversight Committee reviewed the constitutionality of laws and acts. The Soviet Union used the inquisitorial system of Roman law, where the judge, procurator, and defence attorney collaborate to establish the truth.Constitutionally, the USSR was a federation of constituent Union Republics, which were either unitary states, such as Ukraine or Byelorussia (SSRs), or federations, such as Russia or Transcaucasia (SFSRs), all four being the founding republics who signed the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR in December 1922. In 1924, during the national delimitation in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were formed from parts of Russia's Turkestan ASSR and two Soviet dependencies, the Khorezm and Bukharan SSRs. In 1929, Tajikistan was split off from the Uzbekistan SSR. With the constitution of 1936, the Transcaucasian SFSR was dissolved, resulting in its constituent republics of Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan being elevated to Union Republics, while Kazakhstan and Kirghizia were split off from Russian SFSR, resulting in the same status. In August 1940, Moldavia was formed from parts of Ukraine and Bessarabia and northern Bukovina. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (SSRs) were also admitted into the union which was not recognized by most of the international community and was considered an illegal occupation. Karelia was split off from Russia as a Union Republic in March 1940 and was reabsorbed in 1956. Between July 1956 and September 1991, there were 15 union republics (see map below).While nominally a union of equals, in practice the Soviet Union was dominated by Russians. The domination was so absolute that for most of its existence, the country was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to as "Russia". While the RSFSR was technically only one republic within the larger union, it was by far the largest (both in terms of population and area), most powerful, most developed, and the industrial center of the Soviet Union. Historian Matthew White wrote that it was an open secret that the country's federal structure was "window dressing" for Russian dominance. For that reason, the people of the USSR were usually called "Russians", not "Soviets", since "everyone knew who really ran the show".Under the Military Law of September 1925, the Soviet Armed Forces consisted of the Land Forces, the Air Force, the Navy, Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU), and the Internal Troops. The OGPU later became independent and in 1934 joined the NKVD, and so its internal troops were under the joint leadership of the defense and internal commissariats. After World War II, Strategic Missile Forces (1959), Air Defense Forces (1948) and National Civil Defense Forces (1970) were formed, which ranked first, third, and sixth in the official Soviet system of importance (ground forces were second, Air Force Fourth, and Navy Fifth).The army had the greatest political influence. In 1989, there served two million soldiers divided between 150 motorized and 52 armored divisions. Until the early 1960s, the Soviet navy was a rather small military branch, but after the Caribbean crisis, under the leadership of Sergei Gorshkov, it expanded significantly. It became known for battlecruisers and submarines. In 1989 there served 500 000 men. The Soviet Air Force focused on a fleet of strategic bombers and during war situation was to eradicate enemy infrastructure and nuclear capacity. The air force also had a number of fighters and tactical bombers to support the army in the war. Strategic missile forces had more than 1,400 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), deployed between 28 bases and 300 command centers.In the post-war period, the Soviet Army was directly involved in several military operations abroad. These included the suppression of the uprising in East Germany (1953), Hungarian revolution (1956) and the invasion of Czechoslovakia (1968). The Soviet Union also participated in the war in Afghanistan between 1979 and 1989.In the Soviet Union, general conscription applied.At the end of the 1950s, with the help of engineers and technologies captured and imported from defeated Nazi Germany, the Soviets constructed the first satellite – Sputnik 1 and thus overtook the United States in terms of utilizing space. This was followed by other successful satellites, where test dogs flight was sent. On April 12, 1961, the first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, was sent to the space. He once flew around the Earth and successfully landed in the Kazakh steppe. At that time, the first plans for space shuttles and orbital stations were drawn up in Soviet design offices, but in the end personal disputes between designers and management prevented this.As for Lunar space program; USSR only had a program on automated spacecraft launches; with no manned spacecraft used; passing on the "Moon Race" part of Space Race.In the 1970s, specific proposals for the design of the space shuttle began to emerge, but shortcomings, especially in the electronics industry (rapid overheating of electronics), postponed the program until the end of the 1980s. The first shuttle, the Buran, flew in 1988, but without a human crew. Another shuttle, "Ptichka", eventually ended up under construction, as the shuttle project was canceled in 1991. For their launch into space, there is today an unused superpower rocket, Energia, which is the most powerful in the world.In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union managed to build the "Mir" orbital station. It was built on the construction of "Salyut" stations and its only role was civilian-grade research tasks. The Soviet Union adopted a command economy, whereby production and distribution of goods were centralized and directed by the government. The first Bolshevik experience with a command economy was the policy of War communism, which involved the nationalization of industry, centralized distribution of output, coercive requisition of agricultural production, and attempts to eliminate money circulation, private enterprises and free trade. After the severe economic collapse, Lenin replaced war communism by the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1921, legalizing free trade and private ownership of small businesses. The economy quickly recovered as a result.After a long debate among the members of the Politburo about the course of economic development, by 1928–1929, upon gaining control of the country, Stalin abandoned the NEP and pushed for full central planning, starting forced collectivization of agriculture and enacting draconian labor legislation. Resources were mobilized for rapid industrialization, which significantly expanded Soviet capacity in heavy industry and capital goods during the 1930s. The primary motivation for industrialization was preparation for war, mostly due to distrust of the outside capitalist world. As a result, the USSR was transformed from a largely agrarian economy into a great industrial power, leading the way for its emergence as a superpower after World War II. The war caused extensive devastation of the Soviet economy and infrastructure, which required massive reconstruction.By the early 1940s, the Soviet economy had become relatively self-sufficient; for most of the period until the creation of Comecon, only a tiny share of domestic products was traded internationally. After the creation of the Eastern Bloc, external trade rose rapidly. However, the influence of the world economy on the USSR was limited by fixed domestic prices and a state monopoly on foreign trade. Grain and sophisticated consumer manufactures became major import articles from around the 1960s. During the arms race of the Cold War, the Soviet economy was burdened by military expenditures, heavily lobbied for by a powerful bureaucracy dependent on the arms industry. At the same time, the USSR became the largest arms exporter to the Third World. Significant amounts of Soviet resources during the Cold War were allocated in aid to the other socialist states.From the 1930s until its dissolution in late 1991, the way the Soviet economy operated remained essentially unchanged. The economy was formally directed by central planning, carried out by Gosplan and organized in five-year plans. However, in practice, the plans were highly aggregated and provisional, subject to "ad hoc" intervention by superiors. All critical economic decisions were taken by the political leadership. Allocated resources and plan targets were usually denominated in rubles rather than in physical goods. Credit was discouraged, but widespread. The final allocation of output was achieved through relatively decentralized, unplanned contracting. Although in theory prices were legally set from above, in practice they were often negotiated, and informal horizontal links (e.g. between producer factories) were widespread.A number of basic services were state-funded, such as education and health care. In the manufacturing sector, heavy industry and defence were prioritized over consumer goods. Consumer goods, particularly outside large cities, were often scarce, of poor quality and limited variety. Under the command economy, consumers had almost no influence on production, and the changing demands of a population with growing incomes could not be satisfied by supplies at rigidly fixed prices. A massive unplanned second economy grew up at low levels alongside the planned one, providing some of the goods and services that the planners could not. The legalization of some elements of the decentralized economy was attempted with the reform of 1965.Although statistics of the Soviet economy are notoriously unreliable and its economic growth difficult to estimate precisely, by most accounts, the economy continued to expand until the mid-1980s. During the 1950s and 1960s, it had comparatively high growth and was catching up to the West. However, after 1970, the growth, while still positive, steadily declined much more quickly and consistently than in other countries, despite a rapid increase in the capital stock (the rate of capital increase was only surpassed by Japan).Overall, the growth rate of per capita income in the Soviet Union between 1960 and 1989 was slightly above the world average (based on 102 countries). According to Stanley Fischer and William Easterly, growth could have been faster. By their calculation, per capita income in 1989 should have been twice higher than it was, considering the amount of investment, education and population. The authors attribute this poor performance to the low productivity of capital. Steven Rosenfielde states that the standard of living declined due to Stalin's despotism. While there was a brief improvement after his death, it lapsed into stagnation.In 1987, Mikhail Gorbachev attempted to reform and revitalize the economy with his program of "perestroika". His policies relaxed state control over enterprises but did not replace it by market incentives, resulting in a sharp decline in output. The economy, already suffering from reduced petroleum export revenues, started to collapse. Prices were still fixed, and the property was still largely state-owned until after the country's dissolution. For most of the period after World War II until its collapse, Soviet GDP (PPP) was the second-largest in the world, and third during the second half of the 1980s, although on a per-capita basis, it was behind that of First World countries. Compared to countries with similar per-capita GDP in 1928, the Soviet Union experienced significant growth.In 1990, the country had a Human Development Index of 0.920, placing it in the "high" category of human development. It was the third-highest in the Eastern Bloc, behind Czechoslovakia and East Germany, and the 25th in the world of 130 countries.The need for fuel declined in the Soviet Union from the 1970s to the 1980s, both per ruble of gross social product and per ruble of industrial product. At the start, this decline grew very rapidly but gradually slowed down between 1970 and 1975. From 1975 and 1980, it grew even slower, only 2.6%. David Wilson, a historian, believed that the gas industry would account for 40% of Soviet fuel production by the end of the century. His theory did not come to fruition because of the USSR's collapse. The USSR, in theory, would have continued to have an economic growth rate of 2–2.5% during the 1990s because of Soviet energy fields. However, the energy sector faced many difficulties, among them the country's high military expenditure and hostile relations with the First World.In 1991, the Soviet Union had a pipeline network of for crude oil and another for natural gas. Petroleum and petroleum-based products, natural gas, metals, wood, agricultural products, and a variety of manufactured goods, primarily machinery, arms and military equipment, were exported. In the 1970s and 1980s, the USSR heavily relied on fossil fuel exports to earn hard currency. At its peak in 1988, it was the largest producer and second-largest exporter of crude oil, surpassed only by Saudi Arabia.The Soviet Union placed great emphasis on science and technology within its economy, however, the most remarkable Soviet successes in technology, such as producing the world's first space satellite, typically were the responsibility of the military. Lenin believed that the USSR would never overtake the developed world if it remained as technologically backward as it was upon its founding. Soviet authorities proved their commitment to Lenin's belief by developing massive networks, research and development organizations. In the early 1960s, the Soviets awarded 40% of chemistry PhDs to women, compared to only 5% in the United States. By 1989, Soviet scientists were among the world's best-trained specialists in several areas, such as energy physics, selected areas of medicine, mathematics, welding and military technologies. Due to rigid state planning and bureaucracy, the Soviets remained far behind technologically in chemistry, biology, and computers when compared to the First World.Under the Reagan administration, Project Socrates determined that the Soviet Union addressed the acquisition of science and technology in a manner that was radically different from what the US was using. In the case of the US, economic prioritization was being used for indigenous research and development as the means to acquire science and technology in both the private and public sectors. In contrast, the USSR was offensively and defensively maneuvering in the acquisition and utilization of the worldwide technology, to increase the competitive advantage that they acquired from the technology while preventing the US from acquiring a competitive advantage. However, technology-based planning was executed in a centralized, government-centric manner that greatly hindered its flexibility. This was exploited by the US to undermine the strength of the Soviet Union and thus foster its reform.Transport was a vital component of the country's economy. The economic centralization of the late 1920s and 1930s led to the development of infrastructure on a massive scale, most notably the establishment of Aeroflot, an aviation enterprise. The country had a wide variety of modes of transport by land, water and air. However, due to inadequate maintenance, much of the road, water and Soviet civil aviation transport were outdated and technologically backward compared to the First World.Soviet rail transport was the largest and most intensively used in the world; it was also better developed than most of its Western counterparts. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, Soviet economists were calling for the construction of more roads to alleviate some of the burdens from the railways and to improve the Soviet government budget. The street network and automotive industry remained underdeveloped, and dirt roads were common outside major cities. Soviet maintenance projects proved unable to take care of even the few roads the country had. By the early-to-mid-1980s, the Soviet authorities tried to solve the road problem by ordering the construction of new ones. Meanwhile, the automobile industry was growing at a faster rate than road construction. The underdeveloped road network led to a growing demand for public transport.Despite improvements, several aspects of the transport sector were still riddled with problems due to outdated infrastructure, lack of investment, corruption and bad decision-making. Soviet authorities were unable to meet the growing demand for transport infrastructure and services.The Soviet merchant navy was one of the largest in the world.Excess deaths throughout World War I and the Russian Civil War (including the postwar famine) amounted to a combined total of 18 million, some 10 million in the 1930s, and more than 26 million in 1941–5. The postwar Soviet population was 45 to 50 million smaller than it would have been if pre-war demographic growth had continued. According to Catherine Merridale, "... reasonable estimate would place the total number of excess deaths for the whole period somewhere around 60 million."The birth rate of the USSR decreased from 44.0 per thousand in 1926 to 18.0 in 1974, mainly due to increasing urbanization and the rising average age of marriages. The mortality rate demonstrated a gradual decrease as well – from 23.7 per thousand in 1926 to 8.7 in 1974. In general, the birth rates of the southern republics in Transcaucasia and Central Asia were considerably higher than those in the northern parts of the Soviet Union, and in some cases even increased in the post–World War II period, a phenomenon partly attributed to slower rates of urbanistion and traditionally earlier marriages in the southern republics. Soviet Europe moved towards sub-replacement fertility, while Soviet Central Asia continued to exhibit population growth well above replacement-level fertility.The late 1960s and the 1970s witnessed a reversal of the declining trajectory of the rate of mortality in the USSR, and was especially notable among men of working age, but was also prevalent in Russia and other predominantly Slavic areas of the country. An analysis of the official data from the late 1980s showed that after worsening in the late-1970s and the early 1980s, adult mortality began to improve again. The infant mortality rate increased from 24.7 in 1970 to 27.9 in 1974. Some researchers regarded the rise as mostly real, a consequence of worsening health conditions and services. The rises in both adult and infant mortality were not explained or defended by Soviet officials, and the Soviet government stopped publishing all mortality statistics for ten years. Soviet demographers and health specialists remained silent about the mortality increases until the late-1980s, when the publication of mortality data resumed, and researchers could delve into the real causes.Under Lenin, the state made explicit commitments to promote the equality of men and women. Many early Russian feminists and ordinary Russian working women actively participated in the Revolution, and many more were affected by the events of that period and the new policies. Beginning in October 1918, Lenin's government liberalized divorce and abortion laws, decriminalized homosexuality (re-criminalized in the 1930s), permitted cohabitation, and ushered in a host of reforms. However, without birth control, the new system produced many broken marriages, as well as countless out-of-wedlock children. The epidemic of divorces and extramarital affairs created social hardships when Soviet leaders wanted people to concentrate their efforts on growing the economy. Giving women control over their fertility also led to a precipitous decline in the birth rate, perceived as a threat to their country's military power. By 1936, Stalin reversed most of the liberal laws, ushering in a pronatalist era that lasted for decades.By 1917, Russia became the first great power to grant women the right to vote. After heavy casualties in World War I and II, women outnumbered men in Russia by a 4:3 ratio. This contributed to the larger role women played in Russian society compared to other great powers at the time.Anatoly Lunacharsky became the first People's Commissar for Education of Soviet Russia. In the beginning, the Soviet authorities placed great emphasis on the elimination of illiteracy. All left-handed children were forced to write with their right hand in the Soviet school system. Literate people were automatically hired as teachers. For a short period, quality was sacrificed for quantity. By 1940, Stalin could announce that illiteracy had been eliminated. Throughout the 1930s, social mobility rose sharply, which has been attributed to reforms in education. In the aftermath of World War II, the country's educational system expanded dramatically, which had a tremendous effect. In the 1960s, nearly all children had access to education, the only exception being those living in remote areas. Nikita Khrushchev tried to make education more accessible, making it clear to children that education was closely linked to the needs of society. Education also became important in giving rise to the New Man. Citizens directly entering the workforce had the constitutional right to a job and to free vocational training.The education system was highly centralized and universally accessible to all citizens, with affirmative action for applicants from nations associated with cultural backwardness. However, as part of the general antisemitic policy, an unofficial Jewish quota was applied in the leading institutions of higher education by subjecting Jewish applicants to harsher entrance examinations. The Brezhnev era also introduced a rule that required all university applicants to present a reference from the local Komsomol party secretary. According to statistics from 1986, the number of higher education students per the population of 10,000 was 181 for the USSR, compared to 517 for the US.The Soviet Union was an ethnically diverse country, with more than 100 distinct ethnic groups. The total population of the country was estimated at 293 million in 1991. According to a 1990 estimate, the majority of the population were Russians (50.78%), followed by Ukrainians (15.45%) and Uzbeks (5.84%).All citizens of the USSR had their own ethnic affiliation. The ethnicity of a person was chosen at the age of sixteen by the child's parents. If the parents did not agree, the child was automatically assigned the ethnicity of the father. Partly due to Soviet policies, some of the smaller minority ethnic groups were considered part of larger ones, such as the Mingrelians of Georgia, who were classified with the linguistically related Georgians. Some ethnic groups voluntarily assimilated, while others were brought in by force. Russians, Belarusians, and Ukrainians, who were all East Slavic and Orthodox, shared close cultural, ethnic, and religious ties, while other groups did not. With multiple nationalities living in the same territory, ethnic antagonisms developed over the years.Members of various ethnicities participated in legislative bodies. Organs of power like the Politburo, the Secretariat of the Central Committee etc., were formally ethnically neutral, but in reality, ethnic Russians were overrepresented, although there were also non-Russian leaders in the Soviet leadership, such as Joseph Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev, Nikolai Podgorny or Andrei Gromyko. During the Soviet era, a significant number of ethnic Russians and Ukrainians migrated to other Soviet republics, and many of them settled there. According to the last census in 1989, the Russian "diaspora" in the Soviet republics had reached 25 million.In 1917, before the revolution, health conditions were significantly behind those of developed countries. As Lenin later noted, "Either the lice will defeat socialism, or socialism will defeat the lice". The Soviet principle of health care was conceived by the People's Commissariat for Health in 1918. Health care was to be controlled by the state and would be provided to its citizens free of charge, a revolutionary concept at the time. Article 42 of the 1977 Soviet Constitution gave all citizens the right to health protection and free access to any health institutions in the USSR. Before Leonid Brezhnev became General Secretary, the Soviet healthcare system was held in high esteem by many foreign specialists. This changed, however, from Brezhnev's accession and Mikhail Gorbachev's tenure as leader, during which the health care system was heavily criticized for many basic faults, such as the quality of service and the unevenness in its provision. Minister of Health Yevgeniy Chazov, during the 19th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, while highlighting such successes as having the most doctors and hospitals in the world, recognized the system's areas for improvement and felt that billions of Soviet rubles were squandered. After the revolution, life expectancy for all age groups went up. This statistic in itself was seen by some that the socialist system was superior to the capitalist system. These improvements continued into the 1960s when statistics indicated that the life expectancy briefly surpassed that of the United States. Life expectancy started to decline in the 1970s, possibly because of alcohol abuse. At the same time, infant mortality began to rise. After 1974, the government stopped publishing statistics on the matter. This trend can be partly explained by the number of pregnancies rising drastically in the Asian part of the country where infant mortality was the highest while declining markedly in the more developed European part of the Soviet Union.Soviet dental technology and dental health were considered notoriously bad. In 1991, the average 35-year-old had 12 to 14 cavities, fillings or missing teeth. Toothpaste was often not available, and toothbrushes did not conform to standards of modern dentistry.Under Lenin, the government gave small language groups their own writing systems. The development of these writing systems was highly successful, even though some flaws were detected. During the later days of the USSR, countries with the same multilingual situation implemented similar policies. A serious problem when creating these writing systems was that the languages differed dialectally greatly from each other. When a language had been given a writing system and appeared in a notable publication, it would attain "official language" status. There were many minority languages which never received their own writing system; therefore, their speakers were forced to have a second language. There are examples where the government retreated from this policy, most notably under Stalin where education was discontinued in languages that were not widespread. These languages were then assimilated into another language, mostly Russian. During World War II, some minority languages were banned, and their speakers accused of collaborating with the enemy.As the most widely spoken of the Soviet Union's many languages, Russian "de facto" functioned as an official language, as the "language of interethnic communication" (), but only assumed the "de jure" status as the official national language in 1990.Christianity and Islam had the highest number of adherents among the religious citizens. Eastern Christianity predominated among Christians, with Russia's traditional Russian Orthodox Church being the largest Christian denomination. About 90% of the Soviet Union's Muslims were Sunnis, with Shias being concentrated in the Azerbaijan SSR. Smaller groups included Roman Catholics, Jews, Buddhists, and a variety of Protestant denominations (especially Baptists and Lutherans).Religious influence had been strong in the Russian Empire. The Russian Orthodox Church enjoyed a privileged status as the church of the monarchy and took part in carrying out official state functions. The immediate period following the establishment of the Soviet state included a struggle against the Orthodox Church, which the revolutionaries considered an ally of the former ruling classes.In Soviet law, the "freedom to hold religious services" was constitutionally guaranteed, although the ruling Communist Party regarded religion as incompatible with the Marxist spirit of scientific materialism. In practice, the Soviet system subscribed to a narrow interpretation of this right, and in fact utilized a range of official measures to discourage religion and curb the activities of religious groups.The 1918 Council of People's Commissars decree establishing the Russian SFSR as a secular state also decreed that "the teaching of religion in all [places] where subjects of general instruction are taught, is forbidden. Citizens may teach and may be taught religion privately." Among further restrictions, those adopted in 1929 included express prohibitions on a range of church activities, including meetings for organized Bible study. Both Christian and non-Christian establishments were shut down by the thousands in the 1920s and 1930s. By 1940, as many as 90% of the churches, synagogues, and mosques that had been operating in 1917 were closed.Under the doctrine of state atheism, a "government-sponsored program of forced conversion to atheism" was conducted. The government targeted religions based on state interests, and while most organized religions were never outlawed, religious property was confiscated, believers were harassed, and religion was ridiculed while atheism was propagated in schools. In 1925, the government founded the League of Militant Atheists to intensify the propaganda campaign. Accordingly, although personal expressions of religious faith were not explicitly banned, a strong sense of social stigma was imposed on them by the formal structures and mass media, and it was generally considered unacceptable for members of certain professions (teachers, state bureaucrats, soldiers) to be openly religious. While persecution accelerated following Stalin's rise to power, a revival of Orthodoxy was fostered by the government during World War II and the Soviet authorities sought to control the Russian Orthodox Church rather than liquidate it. During the first five years of Soviet power, the Bolsheviks executed 28 Russian Orthodox bishops and over 1,200 Russian Orthodox priests. Many others were imprisoned or exiled. Believers were harassed and persecuted. Most seminaries were closed, and the publication of most religious material was prohibited. By 1941, only 500 churches remained open out of about 54,000 in existence before World War I.Convinced that religious anti-Sovietism had become a thing of the past, and with the looming threat of war, the Stalin regime began shifting to a more moderate religion policy in the late 1930s. Soviet religious establishments overwhelmingly rallied to support the war effort during World War II. Amid other accommodations to religious faith after the German invasion, churches were reopened. Radio Moscow began broadcasting a religious hour, and a historic meeting between Stalin and Orthodox Church leader Patriarch Sergius of Moscow was held in 1943. Stalin had the support of the majority of the religious people in the USSR even through the late 1980s. The general tendency of this period was an increase in religious activity among believers of all faiths.Under Nikita Khrushchev, the state leadership clashed with the churches in 1958–1964, a period when atheism was emphasized in the educational curriculum, and numerous state publications promoted atheistic views. During this period, the number of churches fell from 20,000 to 10,000 from 1959 to 1965, and the number of synagogues dropped from 500 to 97. The number of working mosques also declined, falling from 1,500 to 500 within a decade.Religious institutions remained monitored by the Soviet government, but churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques were all given more leeway in the Brezhnev era. Official relations between the Orthodox Church and the government again warmed to the point that the Brezhnev government twice honored Orthodox Patriarch Alexy I with the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. A poll conducted by Soviet authorities in 1982 recorded 20% of the Soviet population as "active religious believers."The legacy of the USSR remains a controversial topic. The socio-economic nature of communist states such as the USSR, especially under Stalin, has also been much debated, varyingly being labelled a form of bureaucratic collectivism, state capitalism, state socialism, or a totally unique mode of production.The USSR implemented a broad range of policies over a long period of time, with a large amount of conflicting policies being implemented by different leaders. Some have a positive view of it whilst others are critical towards the country, calling it a repressive oligarchy. The opinions on the USSR are complex and have changed over time, with different generations having different views on the matter as well as on Soviet policies corresponding to separate time periods during its history. Leftists have largely varying views on the USSR. Whilst some leftists such as anarchists and other libertarian socialists, agree it did not give the workers control over the means of production and was a centralized oligarchy, others have more positive opinions as to the Bolshevik policies and Vladimir Lenin. Many anti-Stalinist leftists such as anarchists are extremely critical of Soviet authoritarianism and repression. Much of the criticism it receives is centered around massacres in the Soviet Union, the centralized hierarchy present in the USSR and mass political repression as well as violence towards government critics and political dissidents such as other leftists. Critics also point towards its failure to implement any substantial worker cooperatives or implementing worker liberation as well as corruption and the Soviet authoritarian nature.Many Russians and other former Soviet citizens have nostalgia for the USSR, pointing towards most infrastructure being built during Soviet times, increased job security, increased literacy rate, increased caloric intake and supposed ethnic pluralism enacted in the Soviet Union as well as political stability. The Russian Revolution is also seen in a positive light as well as the leadership of Lenin, Nikita Khrushchev and the later USSR, although many view Joseph Stalin's rule as positive for the country. In Armenia, 12% of respondents said the USSR collapse did good, while 66% said it did harm. In Kyrgyzstan, 16% of respondents said the collapse of the USSR did good, while 61% said it did harm. In a 2018 Rating Sociological Group poll, 47% of Ukrainian respondents had a positive opinion of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, who ruled the Soviet Union from 1964 to 1982. Much of the admiration of the USSR comes from the failings of the modern post-Soviet governments such as the control by oligarchs, corruption and outdated Soviet-era infrastructure as well as the rise and dominance of organised crime after the collapse of the USSR all directly leading into nostalgia for it.The 1941–45 period of World War II is still known in Russia as the "Great Patriotic War". The war became a topic of great importance in cinema, literature, history lessons at school, the mass media, and the arts. As a result of the massive losses suffered by the military and civilians during the conflict, Victory Day celebrated on 9 May is still one of the most important and emotional dates in Russia.In some post Soviet republics, there is a more negative view of the USSR, although there is no unanimity on the matter. In large part due to the Holodomor, ethnic Ukrainians have a negative view of it. Russian-speaking Ukrainians of Ukraine's southern and eastern regions have a more positive view of the USSR. In some countries with internal conflict, there is also nostalgia for the USSR, especially for refugees of the post-Soviet conflicts who have been forced to flee their homes and have been displaced. This nostalgia is less an admiration for the country or its policies than it is a longing to return to their homes and not to live in poverty. The many Russian enclaves in the former USSR republics such as Transnistria have in a general a positive remembrance of it.The left's view of the USSR is complex. While some leftists regard the USSR as an example of state capitalism or that it was an oligarchical state, other leftists admire Vladimir Lenin and the Russian Revolution.Council communists generally view the USSR as failing to create class consciousness, turning into a corrupt state in which the elite controlled society. Anarchists are critical of the country, labeling the Soviet system as "red fascism". Soviets actively destroyed anarchist organizations and anarchist communities, labeling anarchists as "enemies of the people". Factors contributing to the animosity towards the USSR included: the Soviet invasion of the anarchist Free Territory, the suppression of the anarchist Kronstadt rebellion and the response to the Norilsk uprising, in which prisoners created a radical system of government based on cooperatives and direct democracy in the Gulag. Anarchist organizations and unions were also banned during the Spanish Civil War under the Republican government by orders from the Soviet government. Due to this, anarchists generally hold a large animosity towards the USSR.The culture of the Soviet Union passed through several stages during the USSR's existence. During the first decade following the revolution, there was relative freedom and artists experimented with several different styles to find a distinctive Soviet style of art. Lenin wanted art to be accessible to the Russian people. On the other hand, hundreds of intellectuals, writers, and artists were exiled or executed, and their work banned, such as Nikolay Gumilyov who was shot for alleged conspiring against the Bolshevik regime, and Yevgeny Zamyatin.The government encouraged a variety of trends. In art and literature, numerous schools, some traditional and others radically experimental, proliferated. Communist writers Maxim Gorky and Vladimir Mayakovsky were active during this time. As a means of influencing a largely illiterate society, films received encouragement from the state, and much of director Sergei Eisenstein's best work dates from this period.During Stalin's rule, the Soviet culture was characterized by the rise and domination of the government-imposed style of socialist realism, with all other trends being severely repressed, with rare exceptions, such as Mikhail Bulgakov's works. Many writers were imprisoned and killed.Following the Khrushchev Thaw, censorship was diminished. During this time, a distinctive period of Soviet culture developed, characterized by conformist public life and an intense focus on personal life. Greater experimentation in art forms was again permissible, resulting in the production of more sophisticated and subtly critical work. The regime loosened its emphasis on socialist realism; thus, for instance, many protagonists of the novels of author Yury Trifonov concerned themselves with problems of daily life rather than with building socialism. Underground dissident literature, known as "samizdat", developed during this late period. In architecture, the Khrushchev era mostly focused on functional design as opposed to the highly decorated style of Stalin's epoch. In music, in response to the increasing popularity of forms of popular music like jazz in the West, many jazz orchestras were permitted throughout the USSR, notably the Melodiya Ensemble, named after the principle record label in the USSR.In the second half of the 1980s, Gorbachev's policies of "perestroika" and "glasnost" significantly expanded freedom of expression throughout the country in the media and the press.Founded on 20 July 1924 in Moscow, "Sovetsky Sport" was the first sports newspaper of the Soviet Union.The Soviet Olympic Committee formed on 21 April 1951, and the IOC recognized the new body in its 45th session. In the same year, when the Soviet representative Konstantin Andrianov became an IOC member, the USSR officially joined the Olympic Movement. The 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki thus became first Olympic Games for Soviet athletes. The Soviet Union was the biggest rival to the United States at the Summer Olympics, winning six of its nine appearances at the games and also topping the medal tally at the Winter Olympics six times. The Soviet Union's Olympics success has been attributed to its large investment in sports to demonstrate its superpower image and political influence on a global stage.The Soviet Union national ice hockey team won nearly every world championship and Olympic tournament between 1954 and 1991 and never failed to medal in any International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) tournament in which they competed.The advent of the state-sponsored "full-time amateur athlete" of the Eastern Bloc countries further eroded the ideology of the pure amateur, as it put the self-financed amateurs of the Western countries at a disadvantage. The Soviet Union entered teams of athletes who were all nominally students, soldiers, or working in a profession – in reality, the state paid many of these competitors to train on a full-time basis. Nevertheless, the IOC held to the traditional rules regarding amateurism.A 1989 report by a committee of the Australian Senate claimed that "there is hardly a medal winner at the Moscow Games, certainly not a gold medal winner...who is not on one sort of drug or another: usually several kinds. The Moscow Games might well have been called the Chemists' Games".A member of the IOC Medical Commission, Manfred Donike, privately ran additional tests with a new technique for identifying abnormal levels of testosterone by measuring its ratio to epitestosterone in urine. Twenty percent of the specimens he tested, including those from sixteen gold medalists, would have resulted in disciplinary proceedings had the tests been official. The results of Donike's unofficial tests later convinced the IOC to add his new technique to their testing protocols. The first documented case of "blood doping" occurred at the 1980 Summer Olympics when a runner was transfused with two pints of blood before winning medals in the 5000 m and 10,000 m.Documentation obtained in 2016 revealed the Soviet Union's plans for a statewide doping system in track and field in preparation for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Dated before the decision to boycott the 1984 Games, the document detailed the existing steroids operations of the program, along with suggestions for further enhancements. Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture prepared the communication, directed to the Soviet Union's head of track and field. Portugalov later became one of the leading figures involved in the implementation of Russian doping before the 2016 Summer Olympics.Official Soviet environmental policy has always attached great importance to actions in which human beings actively improve nature. Lenin's quote "Communism is Soviet power and electrification of the country!" in many respects summarizes the focus on modernization and industrial development. During the first five-year plan in 1928, Stalin proceeded to industrialize the country at all costs. Values such as environmental and nature protection have been completely ignored in the struggle to create a modern industrial society. After Stalin's death, they focused more on environmental issues, but the basic perception of the value of environmental protection remained the same.The Soviet media has always focused on the vast expanse of land and the virtually indestructible natural resources. This made it feel that contamination and uncontrolled exploitation of nature were not a problem. The Soviet state also firmly believed that scientific and technological progress would solve all the problems. Official ideology said that under socialism environmental problems could easily be overcome, unlike capitalist countries, where they seemingly could not be solved. The Soviet authorities had an almost unwavering belief that man could transcend nature. However, when the authorities had to admit that there were environmental problems in the USSR in the 1980s, they explained the problems in such a way that socialism had not yet been fully developed; pollution in a socialist society was only a temporary anomaly that would have been resolved if socialism had developed.The Chernobyl disaster in 1986 was the first major accident at a civilian nuclear power plant. Unparalleled in the world, it resulted in a large number of radioactive isotopes being released into the atmosphere. Radioactive doses have scattered relatively far. 4,000 new cases of thyroid cancer were reported after the incident, but this led to a relatively low number of deaths (WHO data, 2005). However, the long-term effects of the accident are unknown. Another major accident is the Kyshtym disaster.After the fall of the USSR, it was discovered that the environmental problems were greater than what the Soviet authorities admitted. The Kola Peninsula was one of the places with clear problems. Around the industrial cities of Monchegorsk and Norilsk, where nickel, for example, is mined, all forests have been destroyed by contamination, while the northern and other parts of Russia have been affected by emissions. During the 1990s, people in the West were also interested in the radioactive hazards of nuclear facilities, decommissioned nuclear submarines, and the processing of nuclear waste or spent nuclear fuel. It was also known in the early 1990s that the USSR had transported radioactive material to the Barents Sea and Kara Sea, which was later confirmed by the Russian parliament. The crash of the K-141 Kursk submarine in 2000 in the west further raised concerns. In the past, there were accidents involving submarines K-19, K-8, and K-129.
|
[
"Georgy Malenkov",
"Alexei Kosygin",
"Nikolai Ryzhkov",
"Joseph Stalin",
"Alexei Rykov",
"Ivan Silayev",
"Vladimir Lenin",
"Nikolai Bulganin",
"Nikolai Tikhonov",
"Vyacheslav Molotov",
"Valentin Pavlov"
] |
|
Who was the head of Soviet Union in 18-Mar-195918-March-1959?
|
March 18, 1959
|
{
"text": [
"Nikita Khrushchev"
]
}
|
L2_Q15180_P6_6
|
Nikolai Bulganin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1955 to Mar, 1958.
Nikolai Tikhonov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1980 to Sep, 1985.
Ivan Silayev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1991 to Dec, 1991.
Alexei Kosygin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Oct, 1964 to Oct, 1980.
Valentin Pavlov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jan, 1991 to Aug, 1991.
Nikolai Ryzhkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Sep, 1985 to Jan, 1991.
Georgy Malenkov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1953 to Feb, 1955.
Alexei Rykov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Feb, 1924 to Dec, 1930.
Vyacheslav Molotov is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Dec, 1930 to May, 1941.
Joseph Stalin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from May, 1941 to Mar, 1953.
Nikita Khrushchev is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Mar, 1958 to Oct, 1964.
Vladimir Lenin is the head of the government of Soviet Union from Jul, 1923 to Jan, 1924.
|
Soviet UnionThe Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a socialist state that spanned most of Europe and Asia during its existence from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a federal union of multiple national republics; in practice its government and economy were highly centralized until its final years. The country was a one-party state prior to 1990 governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, with Moscow as its capital within its largest and most populous republic, the Russian SFSR. Other major urban centers were Leningrad (Russian SFSR), Kiev (Ukrainian SSR), Minsk (Byelorussian SSR), Tashkent (Uzbek SSR), Alma-Ata (Kazakh SSR) and Novosibirsk (Russian SFSR). It was the largest country in the world, covering over , and spanning eleven time zones. The Soviet Union's five biomes were tundra, taiga, steppes, desert, and mountains. Its diverse population was officially known as the Soviet people.The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 when the Bolsheviks, headed by Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Provisional Government that had earlier replaced the monarchy of the Russian Empire. They established the Russian Soviet Republic, beginning a civil war between the Bolshevik Red Army and many anti-Bolshevik forces across the former Empire, among whom the largest faction was the White Guard, which engaged in violent anti-communist repression against the Bolsheviks and their worker and peasant supporters known as the White Terror. The Red Army expanded and helped local Bolsheviks take power, establishing soviets, repressing their political opponents and rebellious peasants through Red Terror. By 1922, the Bolsheviks had emerged victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian republics. The New Economic Policy (NEP), which was introduced by Lenin, led to a partial return of a free market and private property; this resulted in a period of economic recovery.Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power. Stalin suppressed all political opposition to his rule inside the Communist Party and inaugurated a command economy. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and forced collectivization, which led to significant economic growth, but also led to a man-made famine in 1932–1933 and expanded the Gulag labour camp system originally established in 1918. Stalin also fomented political paranoia and conducted the Great Purge to remove his actual and perceived opponents from the Party through mass arrests of military leaders, Communist Party members, and ordinary citizens alike, who were then sent to correctional labor camps or sentenced to death.On 23 August 1939, after unsuccessful efforts to form an anti-fascist alliance with Western powers, the Soviets signed the non-aggression agreement with Nazi Germany. After the start of World War II, the formally neutral Soviets invaded and annexed territories of several Eastern European states, including eastern Poland and the Baltic states. In June 1941 the Germans invaded, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the cost of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at intense battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin and won World War II in Europe on 9 May 1945. The territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged in 1947 as a result of a post-war Soviet dominance in Eastern Europe, where the Eastern Bloc confronted the Western Bloc that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949.Following Stalin's death in 1953, a period known as de-Stalinization and the Khrushchev Thaw occurred under the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev. The country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took an early lead in the Space Race with the first ever satellite and the first human spaceflight and the first probe to land on another planet, Venus. In the 1970s, there was a brief "détente" of relations with the United States, but tensions resumed when the Soviet Union deployed troops in Afghanistan in 1979. The war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters.In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to further reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of "glasnost" and "perestroika". The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing economic stagnation. The Cold War ended during his tenure and in 1989, Warsaw Pact countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective Marxist-Leninist regimes. Strong nationalist and separatist movements broke out across the USSR. Gorbachev initiated a referendum—boycotted by the Baltic republics, Armenia, Georgia, and Moldova—which resulted in the majority of participating citizens voting in favor of preserving the Union as a renewed federation. In August 1991, a coup d'état was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a high-profile role in facing down the coup. The main result was the banning of the Communist Party. The republics led by Russia and Ukraine declared independence. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned. All the republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states. The Russian Federation (formerly the Russian SFSR) assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations and is recognized as its continued legal personality in world affairs.The USSR produced many significant social and technological achievements and innovations regarding military power. It boasted the world's second-largest economy and the largest standing military in the world. The USSR was recognized as one of the five nuclear weapons states. It was a founding permanent member of the United Nations Security Council as well as a member of the OSCE, the WFTU and the leading member of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the Warsaw Pact.Before its dissolution, the USSR had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II. Sometimes also called "Soviet Empire", it exercised its hegemony in Eastern Europe and worldwide with military and economic strength, proxy conflicts and influence in developing countries and funding of scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The word "soviet" is derived from the Russian word "sovet" (), meaning "council", "assembly", "advice", ultimately deriving from the proto-Slavic verbal stem of "vět-iti" ("to inform"), related to Slavic "věst" ("news"), English "wise", the root in "ad-vis-or" (which came to English through French), or the Dutch "weten" ("to know"; cf. "wetenschap" meaning "science"). The word "sovietnik" means "councillor".Some organizations in Russian history were called "council" (). In the Russian Empire, the State Council which functioned from 1810 to 1917 was referred to as a Council of Ministers after the revolt of 1905.During the Georgian Affair, Vladimir Lenin envisioned an expression of Great Russian ethnic chauvinism by Joseph Stalin and his supporters, calling for these nation-states to join Russia as semi-independent parts of a greater union which he initially named as the Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia (). Stalin initially resisted the proposal but ultimately accepted it, although with Lenin's agreement changed the name to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), albeit all the republics began as "socialist soviet" and did not change to the other order until 1936. In addition, in the national languages of several republics, the word "council" or "conciliar" in the respective language was only quite late changed to an adaptation of the Russian "soviet" and never in others, e.g. Ukraine."СССР" (in Latin alphabet: "SSSR") is the abbreviation of USSR in Russian. It is written in Cyrillic letters. The Soviets used the Cyrillic abbreviation so frequently that audiences worldwide became familiar with its meaning. Notably, both Cyrillic letters used have homoglyphic (but transliterally distinct) letters in Latin alphabets. Because of widespread familiarity with the Cyrillic abbreviation, Latin alphabet users in particular almost always use the Latin homoglyphs "C" and "P" (as opposed to the transliteral Latin letters "S" and "R") when rendering the USSR's native abbreviation.After "СССР", the most common short form names for the Soviet state in Russian were "Советский Союз" (transliteration: "Sovetskiy Soyuz") which literally means "Soviet Union", and also "Союз ССР" (transliteration: "Soyuz SSR") which, after compensating for grammatical differences, essentially translates to "Union of SSR's" in English.In the English language media, the state was referred to as the Soviet Union or the USSR. In other European languages, the locally translated short forms and abbreviations are usually used such as "Union soviétique" and "URSS" in French, or "Sowjetunion" and "UdSSR" in German. In the English-speaking world, the Soviet Union was also informally called Russia and its citizens Russians, although that was technically incorrect since Russia was only one of the republics. Such misapplications of the linguistic equivalents to the term "Russia" and its derivatives were frequent in other languages as well.The Soviet Union covered an area of over , and was the world's largest country, a status that is retained by its successor state, Russia. It covered a sixth of Earth's land surface, and its size was comparable to the continent of North America. Its western part in Europe accounted for a quarter of the country's area and was the cultural and economic center. The eastern part in Asia extended to the Pacific Ocean to the east and Afghanistan to the south, and, except some areas in Central Asia, was much less populous. It spanned over east to west across eleven time zones, and over north to south. It had five climate zones: tundra, taiga, steppes, desert and mountains.The Soviet Union, similarly to Russia, had the world's longest border, measuring over , or circumferences of Earth. Two-thirds of it was a coastline. The country bordered Afghanistan, China, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Hungary, Iran, Mongolia, North Korea, Norway, Poland, Romania, and Turkey from 1945 to 1991. The Bering Strait separated the country from the United States, while the La Pérouse Strait separated it from Japan.The Soviet Union's highest mountain was Communism Peak (now Ismoil Somoni Peak) in Tajik SSR, at . It also included most of the world's largest lakes; the Caspian Sea (shared with Iran), and Lake Baikal in Russia, the world's largest and deepest freshwater lake.Modern revolutionary activity in the Russian Empire began with the 1825 Decembrist revolt. Although serfdom was abolished in 1861, it was done on terms unfavorable to the peasants and served to encourage revolutionaries. A parliament—the State Duma—was established in 1906 after the Russian Revolution of 1905, but Tsar Nicholas II resisted attempts to move from absolute to a constitutional monarchy. Social unrest continued and was aggravated during World War I by military defeat and food shortages in major cities.A spontaneous popular uprising in Petrograd, in response to the wartime decay of Russia's economy and morale, culminated in the February Revolution and the toppling of Nicholas II and the imperial government in March 1917. The tsarist autocracy was replaced by the Russian Provisional Government, which intended to conduct elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly and to continue fighting on the side of the Entente in World War I.At the same time, workers' councils, known in Russian as "Soviets", sprang up across the country. The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, pushed for socialist revolution in the Soviets and on the streets. On 7 November 1917, the Red Guards stormed the Winter Palace in Petrograd, ending the rule of the Provisional Government and leaving all political power to the Soviets. This event would later be officially known in Soviet bibliographies as the Great October Socialist Revolution. In December, the Bolsheviks signed an armistice with the Central Powers, though by February 1918, fighting had resumed. In March, the Soviets ended involvement in the war and signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.A long and bloody Civil War ensued between the Reds and the Whites, starting in 1917 and ending in 1923 with the Reds' victory. It included foreign intervention, the execution of the former tsar and his family, and the famine of 1921, which killed about five million people. In March 1921, during a related conflict with Poland, the Peace of Riga was signed, splitting disputed territories in Belarus and Ukraine between the Republic of Poland and Soviet Russia. Soviet Russia had to resolve similar conflicts with the newly established republics of Estonia, Finland, Latvia, and Lithuania.On 28 December 1922, a conference of plenipotentiary delegations from the Russian SFSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR approved the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and the Declaration of the Creation of the USSR, forming the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. These two documents were confirmed by the first Congress of Soviets of the USSR and signed by the heads of the delegations, Mikhail Kalinin, Mikhail Tskhakaya, Mikhail Frunze, Grigory Petrovsky, and Alexander Chervyakov, on 30 December 1922. The formal proclamation was made from the stage of the Bolshoi Theatre.An intensive restructuring of the economy, industry and politics of the country began in the early days of Soviet power in 1917. A large part of this was done according to the Bolshevik Initial Decrees, government documents signed by Vladimir Lenin. One of the most prominent breakthroughs was the GOELRO plan, which envisioned a major restructuring of the Soviet economy based on total electrification of the country. The plan became the prototype for subsequent Five-Year Plans and was fulfilled by 1931. After the economic policy of "War communism" during the Russian Civil War, as a prelude to fully developing socialism in the country, the Soviet government permitted some private enterprise to coexist alongside nationalized industry in the 1920s, and total food requisition in the countryside was replaced by a food tax.From its creation, the government in the Soviet Union was based on the one-party rule of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks). The stated purpose was to prevent the return of capitalist exploitation, and that the principles of democratic centralism would be the most effective in representing the people's will in a practical manner. The debate over the future of the economy provided the background for a power struggle in the years after Lenin's death in 1924. Initially, Lenin was to be replaced by a "troika" consisting of Grigory Zinoviev of the Ukrainian SSR, Lev Kamenev of the Russian SFSR, and Joseph Stalin of the Transcaucasian SFSR.On 1 February 1924, the USSR was recognized by the United Kingdom. The same year, a Soviet Constitution was approved, legitimizing the December 1922 union. According to Archie Brown the constitution was never an accurate guide to political reality in the USSR. For example the fact that the Party played the leading role in making and enforcing policy was not mentioned in it until 1977. The USSR was a federative entity of many constituent republics, each with its own political and administrative entities. However, the term "Soviet Russia"strictly applicable only to the Russian Federative Socialist Republicwas often applied to the entire country by non-Soviet writers.On 3 April 1922, Stalin was named the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Lenin had appointed Stalin the head of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate, which gave Stalin considerable power. By gradually consolidating his influence and isolating and outmanoeuvring his rivals within the party, Stalin became the undisputed leader of the country and, by the end of the 1920s, established a totalitarian rule. In October 1927, Zinoviev and Leon Trotsky were expelled from the Central Committee and forced into exile.In 1928, Stalin introduced the first five-year plan for building a socialist economy. In place of the internationalism expressed by Lenin throughout the Revolution, it aimed to build Socialism in One Country. In industry, the state assumed control over all existing enterprises and undertook an intensive program of industrialization. In agriculture, rather than adhering to the "lead by example" policy advocated by Lenin, forced collectivization of farms was implemented all over the country.Famines ensued as a result, causing deaths estimated at three to seven million; surviving kulaks were persecuted, and many were sent to Gulags to do forced labor. Social upheaval continued in the mid-1930s. Despite the turmoil of the mid-to-late 1930s, the country developed a robust industrial economy in the years preceding World War II.Closer cooperation between the USSR and the West developed in the early 1930s. From 1932 to 1934, the country participated in the World Disarmament Conference. In 1933, diplomatic relations between the United States and the USSR were established when in November, the newly elected President of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, chose to recognize Stalin's Communist government formally and negotiated a new trade agreement between the two countries. In September 1934, the country joined the League of Nations. After the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, the USSR actively supported the Republican forces against the Nationalists, who were supported by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany.In December 1936, Stalin unveiled a new constitution that was praised by supporters around the world as the most democratic constitution imaginable, though there was some skepticism. Stalin's Great Purge resulted in the detainment or execution of many "Old Bolsheviks" who had participated in the October Revolution with Lenin. According to declassified Soviet archives, the NKVD arrested more than one and a half million people in 1937 and 1938, of whom 681,692 were shot. Over those two years, there were an average of over one thousand executions a day.In 1939, after attempts to form a military alliance with Britain and France against Germany failed, the Soviet Union made a dramatic shift towards Nazi Germany. Almost a year after Britain and France had concluded the Munich Agreement with Germany, the Soviet Union made agreements with Germany as well, both militarily and economically during extensive talks. The two countries concluded the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and the German–Soviet Commercial Agreement in August 1939. The former made possible the Soviet occupation of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bessarabia, northern Bukovina, and eastern Poland, while the Soviets remained formally neutral. In late November, unable to coerce the Republic of Finland by diplomatic means into moving its border back from Leningrad, Stalin ordered the invasion of Finland. In the east, the Soviet military won several decisive victories during border clashes with the Empire of Japan in 1938 and 1939. However, in April 1941, the USSR signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact with Japan, recognizing the territorial integrity of Manchukuo, a Japanese puppet state.Germany broke the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact and invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941 starting what was known in the USSR as the Great Patriotic War. The Red Army stopped the seemingly invincible German Army at the Battle of Moscow. The Battle of Stalingrad, which lasted from late 1942 to early 1943, dealt a severe blow to Germany from which they never fully recovered and became a turning point in the war. After Stalingrad, Soviet forces drove through Eastern Europe to Berlin before Germany surrendered in 1945. The German Army suffered 80% of its military deaths in the Eastern Front. Harry Hopkins, a close foreign policy advisor to Franklin D. Roosevelt, spoke on 10 August 1943 of the USSR's decisive role in the war.In the same year, the USSR, in fulfilment of its agreement with the Allies at the Yalta Conference, denounced the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1945 and invaded Manchukuo and other Japan-controlled territories on 9 August 1945. This conflict ended with a decisive Soviet victory, contributing to the unconditional surrender of Japan and the end of World War II.The USSR suffered greatly in the war, losing around 27 million people. Approximately 2.8 million Soviet POWs died of starvation, mistreatment, or executions in just eight months of 1941–42. During the war, the country together with the United States, the United Kingdom and China were considered the Big Four Allied powers, and later became the Four Policemen that formed the basis of the United Nations Security Council. It emerged as a superpower in the post-war period. Once denied diplomatic recognition by the Western world, the USSR had official relations with practically every country by the late 1940s. A member of the United Nations at its foundation in 1945, the country became one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, which gave it the right to veto any of its resolutions.During the immediate post-war period, the Soviet Union rebuilt and expanded its economy, while maintaining its strictly centralized control. It took effective control over most of the countries of Eastern Europe (except Yugoslavia and later Albania), turning them into satellite states. The USSR bound its satellite states in a military alliance, the Warsaw Pact, in 1955, and an economic organization, Council for Mutual Economic Assistance or Comecon, a counterpart to the European Economic Community (EEC), from 1949 to 1991. The USSR concentrated on its own recovery, seizing and transferring most of Germany's industrial plants, and it exacted war reparations from East Germany, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria using Soviet-dominated joint enterprises. It also instituted trading arrangements deliberately designed to favor the country. Moscow controlled the Communist parties that ruled the satellite states, and they followed orders from the Kremlin. Later, the Comecon supplied aid to the eventually victorious Communist Party of China, and its influence grew elsewhere in the world. Fearing its ambitions, the Soviet Union's wartime allies, the United Kingdom and the United States, became its enemies. In the ensuing Cold War, the two sides clashed indirectly in proxy wars.Stalin died on 5 March 1953. Without a mutually agreeable successor, the highest Communist Party officials initially opted to rule the Soviet Union jointly through a troika headed by Georgy Malenkov. This did not last, however, and Nikita Khrushchev eventually won the ensuing power struggle by the mid-1950s. In 1956, he denounced Joseph Stalin and proceeded to ease controls over the party and society. This was known as de-Stalinization.Moscow considered Eastern Europe to be a critically vital buffer zone for the forward defence of its western borders, in case of another major invasion such as the German invasion of 1941. For this reason, the USSR sought to cement its control of the region by transforming the Eastern European countries into satellite states, dependent upon and subservient to its leadership. As a result, Soviet military forces were used to suppress an anti-communist uprising in Hungary in 1956.In the late 1950s, a confrontation with China regarding the Soviet rapprochement with the West, and what Mao Zedong perceived as Khrushchev's revisionism, led to the Sino–Soviet split. This resulted in a break throughout the global Marxist–Leninist movement, with the governments in Albania, Cambodia and Somalia choosing to ally with China.During this period of the late 1950s and early 1960s, the USSR continued to realize scientific and technological exploits in the Space Race, rivaling the United States: launching the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1 in 1957; a living dog named Laika in 1957; the first human being, Yuri Gagarin in 1961; the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova in 1963; Alexei Leonov, the first person to walk in space in 1965; the first soft landing on the Moon by spacecraft Luna 9 in 1966; and the first Moon rovers, Lunokhod 1 and Lunokhod 2.Khrushchev initiated "The Thaw", a complex shift in political, cultural and economic life in the country. This included some openness and contact with other nations and new social and economic policies with more emphasis on commodity goods, allowing a dramatic rise in living standards while maintaining high levels of economic growth. Censorship was relaxed as well. Khrushchev's reforms in agriculture and administration, however, were generally unproductive. In 1962, he precipitated a crisis with the United States over the Soviet deployment of nuclear missiles in Cuba. An agreement was made with the United States to remove nuclear missiles from both Cuba and Turkey, concluding the crisis. This event caused Khrushchev much embarrassment and loss of prestige, resulting in his removal from power in 1964.Following the ousting of Khrushchev, another period of collective leadership ensued, consisting of Leonid Brezhnev as General Secretary, Alexei Kosygin as Premier and Nikolai Podgorny as Chairman of the Presidium, lasting until Brezhnev established himself in the early 1970s as the preeminent Soviet leader.In 1968, the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact allies invaded Czechoslovakia to halt the Prague Spring reforms. In the aftermath, Brezhnev justified the invasion and previous military interventions as well as any potential military interventions in the future by introducing the Brezhnev Doctrine, which proclaimed any threat to socialist rule in a Warsaw Pact state as a threat to all Warsaw Pact states, therefore justifying military intervention.Brezhnev presided throughout "détente" with the West that resulted in treaties on armament control (SALT I, SALT II, Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty) while at the same time building up Soviet military might.In October 1977, the third Soviet Constitution was unanimously adopted. The prevailing mood of the Soviet leadership at the time of Brezhnev's death in 1982 was one of aversion to change. The long period of Brezhnev's rule had come to be dubbed one of "standstill", with an ageing and ossified top political leadership. This period is also known as the Era of Stagnation, a period of adverse economic, political, and social effects in the country, which began during the rule of Brezhnev and continued under his successors Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko.In late 1979, the Soviet Union's military intervened in the ongoing civil war in neighboring Afghanistan, effectively ending a détente with the West.Two developments dominated the decade that followed: the increasingly apparent crumbling of the Soviet Union's economic and political structures, and the patchwork attempts at reforms to reverse that process. Kenneth S. Deffeyes argued in "Beyond Oil" that the Reagan administration encouraged Saudi Arabia to lower the price of oil to the point where the Soviets could not make a profit selling their oil, and resulted in the depletion of the country's hard currency reserves.Brezhnev's next two successors, transitional figures with deep roots in his tradition, did not last long. Yuri Andropov was 68 years old and Konstantin Chernenko 72 when they assumed power; both died in less than two years. In an attempt to avoid a third short-lived leader, in 1985, the Soviets turned to the next generation and selected Mikhail Gorbachev. He made significant changes in the economy and party leadership, called "perestroika". His policy of "glasnost" freed public access to information after decades of heavy government censorship. Gorbachev also moved to end the Cold War. In 1988, the USSR abandoned its war in Afghanistan and began to withdraw its forces. In the following year, Gorbachev refused to interfere in the internal affairs of the Soviet satellite states, which paved the way for the Revolutions of 1989. In particular, the standstill of the Soviet Union at the Pan-European Picnic in August 1989 then set a peaceful chain reaction in motion at the end of which the Eastern Bloc collapsed. With the tearing down of the Berlin Wall and with East and West Germany pursuing unification, the Iron Curtain between the West and Soviet-controlled regions came down.At the same time, the Soviet republics started legal moves towards potentially declaring sovereignty over their territories, citing the freedom to secede in Article 72 of the USSR constitution. On 7 April 1990, a law was passed allowing a republic to secede if more than two-thirds of its residents voted for it in a referendum. Many held their first free elections in the Soviet era for their own national legislatures in 1990. Many of these legislatures proceeded to produce legislation contradicting the Union laws in what was known as the "War of Laws". In 1989, the Russian SFSR convened a newly elected Congress of People's Deputies. Boris Yeltsin was elected its chairman. On 12 June 1990, the Congress declared Russia's sovereignty over its territory and proceeded to pass laws that attempted to supersede some of the Soviet laws. After a landslide victory of Sąjūdis in Lithuania, that country declared its independence restored on 11 March 1990.A referendum for the preservation of the USSR was held on 17 March 1991 in nine republics (the remainder having boycotted the vote), with the majority of the population in those republics voting for preservation of the Union. The referendum gave Gorbachev a minor boost. In the summer of 1991, the New Union Treaty, which would have turned the country into a much looser Union, was agreed upon by eight republics. The signing of the treaty, however, was interrupted by the August Coup—an attempted coup d'état by hardline members of the government and the KGB who sought to reverse Gorbachev's reforms and reassert the central government's control over the republics. After the coup collapsed, Yeltsin was seen as a hero for his decisive actions, while Gorbachev's power was effectively ended. The balance of power tipped significantly towards the republics. In August 1991, Latvia and Estonia immediately declared the restoration of their full independence (following Lithuania's 1990 example). Gorbachev resigned as general secretary in late August, and soon afterwards, the party's activities were indefinitely suspended—effectively ending its rule. By the fall, Gorbachev could no longer influence events outside Moscow, and he was being challenged even there by Yeltsin, who had been elected President of Russia in July 1991.The remaining 12 republics continued discussing new, increasingly looser, models of the Union. However, by December all except Russia and Kazakhstan had formally declared independence. During this time, Yeltsin took over what remained of the Soviet government, including the Moscow Kremlin. The final blow was struck on 1 December when Ukraine, the second-most powerful republic, voted overwhelmingly for independence. Ukraine's secession ended any realistic chance of the country staying together even on a limited scale.On 8 December 1991, the presidents of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus (formerly Byelorussia), signed the Belavezha Accords, which declared the Soviet Union dissolved and established the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in its place. While doubts remained over the authority of the accords to do this, on 21 December 1991, the representatives of all Soviet republics except Georgia signed the Alma-Ata Protocol, which confirmed the accords. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned as the President of the USSR, declaring the office extinct. He turned the powers that had been vested in the presidency over to Yeltsin. That night, the Soviet flag was lowered for the last time, and the Russian tricolor was raised in its place.The following day, the Supreme Soviet, the highest governmental body, voted both itself and the country out of existence. This is generally recognized as marking the official, final dissolution of the Soviet Union as a functioning state, and the end of the Cold War. The Soviet Army initially remained under overall CIS command but was soon absorbed into the different military forces of the newly independent states. The few remaining Soviet institutions that had not been taken over by Russia ceased to function by the end of 1991.Following the dissolution, Russia was internationally recognized as its legal successor on the international stage. To that end, Russia voluntarily accepted all Soviet foreign debt and claimed Soviet overseas properties as its own. Under the 1992 Lisbon Protocol, Russia also agreed to receive all nuclear weapons remaining in the territory of other former Soviet republics. Since then, the Russian Federation has assumed the Soviet Union's rights and obligations. Ukraine has refused to recognize exclusive Russian claims to succession of the USSR and claimed such status for Ukraine as well, which was codified in Articles 7 and 8 of its 1991 law On Legal Succession of Ukraine. Since its independence in 1991, Ukraine has continued to pursue claims against Russia in foreign courts, seeking to recover its share of the foreign property that was owned by the USSR.The dissolution was followed by a severe drop in economic and social conditions in post-Soviet states, including a rapid increase in poverty, crime, corruption, unemployment, homelessness, rates of disease, infant mortality and domestic violence, as well as demographic losses and income inequality and the rise of an oligarchical class, along with decreases in calorie intake, life expectancy, adult literacy, and income. Between 1988–1989 and 1993–1995, the Gini ratio increased by an average of 9 points for all former socialist countries. The economic shocks that accompanied wholesale privatization were associated with sharp increases in mortality. Data shows Russia, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia saw a tripling of unemployment and a 42% increase in male death rates between 1991 and 1994. In the following decades, only five or six of the post-communist states are on a path to joining the wealthy capitalist West while most are falling behind, some to such an extent that it will take over fifty years to catch up to where they were before the fall of the Soviet Bloc.In summing up the international ramifications of these events, Vladislav Zubok stated: "The collapse of the Soviet empire was an event of epochal geopolitical, military, ideological, and economic significance." Before the dissolution, the country had maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades after World War II through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, military strength, economic strength, aid to developing countries, and scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.The analysis of the succession of states for the 15 post-Soviet states is complex. The Russian Federation is seen as the legal "continuator" state and is for most purposes the heir to the Soviet Union. It retained ownership of all former Soviet embassy properties, as well as the old Soviet UN membership and permanent membership on the Security Council.Of the two other co-founding states of the USSR at the time of the dissolution, Ukraine was the only one that had passed laws, similar to Russia, that it is a state-successor of both the Ukrainian SSR and the USSR. Soviet treaties laid groundwork for Ukraine's future foreign agreements as well as they led to Ukraine agreeing to undertake 16.37% of debts of the Soviet Union for which it was going to receive its share of USSR's foreign property. Although it had a tough position at the time, due to Russia's position as a "single continuation of the USSR" that became widely accepted in the West as well as a constant pressure from the Western countries, allowed Russia to dispose state property of USSR abroad and conceal information about it. Due to that Ukraine never ratified "zero option" agreement that Russian Federation had signed with other former Soviet republics, as it denied disclosing of information about Soviet Gold Reserves and its Diamond Fund. The dispute over former Soviet property and assets between the two former republics is still ongoing:Similar situation occurred with restitution of cultural property. Although on 14 February 1992 Russia and other former Soviet republics signed agreement "On the return of cultural and historic property to the origin states" in Minsk, it was halted by Russian State Duma that had eventually passed "Federal Law on Cultural Valuables Displaced to the USSR as a Result of the Second World War and Located on the Territory of the Russian Federation" which made restitution currently impossible.There are additionally four states that claim independence from the other internationally recognised post-Soviet states but possess limited international recognition: Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, South Ossetia and Transnistria. The Chechen separatist movement of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria lacks any international recognition.During his rule, Stalin always made the final policy decisions. Otherwise, Soviet foreign policy was set by the commission on the Foreign Policy of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, or by the party's highest body the Politburo. Operations were handled by the separate Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It was known as the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (or Narkomindel), until 1946. The most influential spokesmen were Georgy Chicherin (1872–1936), Maxim Litvinov (1876–1951), Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986), Andrey Vyshinsky (1883–1954) and Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989). Intellectuals were based in the Moscow State Institute of International Relations.The Marxist-Leninist leadership of the Soviet Union intensely debated foreign policy issues and change directions several times. Even after Stalin assumed dictatorial control in the late 1920s, there were debates, and he frequently changed positions.During the country's early period, it was assumed that Communist revolutions would break out soon in every major industrial country, and it was the Soviet responsibility to assist them. The Comintern was the weapon of choice. A few revolutions did break out, but they were quickly suppressed (the longest lasting one was in Hungary)—the Hungarian Soviet Republic—lasted only from 21 March 1919 to 1 August 1919. The Russian Bolsheviks were in no position to give any help.By 1921, Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin realized that capitalism had stabilized itself in Europe and there would not be any widespread revolutions anytime soon. It became the duty of the Russian Bolsheviks to protect what they had in Russia, and avoid military confrontations that might destroy their bridgehead. Russia was now a pariah state, along with Germany. The two came to terms in 1922 with the Treaty of Rapallo that settled long-standing grievances. At the same time, the two countries secretly set up training programs for the illegal German army and air force operations at hidden camps in the USSR.Moscow eventually stopped threatening other states, and instead worked to open peaceful relationships in terms of trade, and diplomatic recognition. The United Kingdom dismissed the warnings of Winston Churchill and a few others about a continuing Marxist-Leninist threat, and opened trade relations and "de facto" diplomatic recognition in 1922. There was hope for a settlement of the pre-war Tsarist debts, but it was repeatedly postponed. Formal recognition came when the new Labour Party came to power in 1924. All the other countries followed suit in opening trade relations. Henry Ford opened large-scale business relations with the Soviets in the late 1920s, hoping that it would lead to long-term peace. Finally, in 1933, the United States officially recognized the USSR, a decision backed by the public opinion and especially by US business interests that expected an opening of a new profitable market.In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Stalin ordered Marxist-Leninist parties across the world to strongly oppose non-Marxist political parties, labor unions or other organizations on the left. Stalin reversed himself in 1934 with the Popular Front program that called on all Marxist parties to join together with all anti-Fascist political, labor, and organizational forces that were opposed to fascism, especially of the Nazi variety.In 1939, half a year after the Munich Agreement, the USSR attempted to form an anti-Nazi alliance with France and Britain. Adolf Hitler proposed a better deal, which would give the USSR control over much of Eastern Europe through the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact. In September, Germany invaded Poland, and the USSR also invaded later that month, resulting in the partition of Poland. In response, Britain and France declared war on Germany, marking the beginning of World War II.There were three power hierarchies in the Soviet Union: the legislature represented by the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union, the government represented by the Council of Ministers, and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), the only legal party and the final policymaker in the country.At the top of the Communist Party was the Central Committee, elected at Party Congresses and Conferences. In turn, the Central Committee voted for a Politburo (called the Presidium between 1952 and 1966), Secretariat and the General Secretary (First Secretary from 1953 to 1966), the "de facto" highest office in the Soviet Union. Depending on the degree of power consolidation, it was either the Politburo as a collective body or the General Secretary, who always was one of the Politburo members, that effectively led the party and the country (except for the period of the highly personalized authority of Stalin, exercised directly through his position in the Council of Ministers rather than the Politburo after 1941). They were not controlled by the general party membership, as the key principle of the party organization was democratic centralism, demanding strict subordination to higher bodies, and elections went uncontested, endorsing the candidates proposed from above.The Communist Party maintained its dominance over the state mainly through its control over the system of appointments. All senior government officials and most deputies of the Supreme Soviet were members of the CPSU. Of the party heads themselves, Stalin (1941–1953) and Khrushchev (1958–1964) were Premiers. Upon the forced retirement of Khrushchev, the party leader was prohibited from this kind of double membership, but the later General Secretaries for at least some part of their tenure occupied the mostly ceremonial position of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, the nominal head of state. The institutions at lower levels were overseen and at times supplanted by primary party organizations.However, in practice the degree of control the party was able to exercise over the state bureaucracy, particularly after the death of Stalin, was far from total, with the bureaucracy pursuing different interests that were at times in conflict with the party. Nor was the party itself monolithic from top to bottom, although factions were officially banned.The Supreme Soviet (successor of the Congress of Soviets) was nominally the highest state body for most of the Soviet history, at first acting as a rubber stamp institution, approving and implementing all decisions made by the party. However, its powers and functions were extended in the late 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, including the creation of new state commissions and committees. It gained additional powers relating to the approval of the Five-Year Plans and the government budget. The Supreme Soviet elected a Presidium (successor of the Central Executive Committee) to wield its power between plenary sessions, ordinarily held twice a year, and appointed the Supreme Court, the Procurator General and the Council of Ministers (known before 1946 as the Council of People's Commissars), headed by the Chairman (Premier) and managing an enormous bureaucracy responsible for the administration of the economy and society. State and party structures of the constituent republics largely emulated the structure of the central institutions, although the Russian SFSR, unlike the other constituent republics, for most of its history had no republican branch of the CPSU, being ruled directly by the union-wide party until 1990. Local authorities were organized likewise into party committees, local Soviets and executive committees. While the state system was nominally federal, the party was unitary.The state security police (the KGB and ) played an important role in Soviet politics. It was instrumental in the Great Purge, but was brought under strict party control after Stalin's death. Under Yuri Andropov, the KGB engaged in the suppression of political dissent and maintained an extensive network of informers, reasserting itself as a political actor to some extent independent of the party-state structure, culminating in the anti-corruption campaign targeting high-ranking party officials in the late 1970s and early 1980s.The constitution, which was promulgated in 1924, 1936 and 1977, did not limit state power. No formal separation of powers existed between the Party, Supreme Soviet and Council of Ministers that represented executive and legislative branches of the government. The system was governed less by statute than by informal conventions, and no settled mechanism of leadership succession existed. Bitter and at times deadly power struggles took place in the Politburo after the deaths of Lenin and Stalin, as well as after Khrushchev's dismissal, itself due to a decision by both the Politburo and the Central Committee. All leaders of the Communist Party before Gorbachev died in office, except Georgy Malenkov and Khrushchev, both dismissed from the party leadership amid internal struggle within the party.Between 1988 and 1990, facing considerable opposition, Mikhail Gorbachev enacted reforms shifting power away from the highest bodies of the party and making the Supreme Soviet less dependent on them. The Congress of People's Deputies was established, the majority of whose members were directly elected in competitive elections held in March 1989. The Congress now elected the Supreme Soviet, which became a full-time parliament, and much stronger than before. For the first time since the 1920s, it refused to rubber stamp proposals from the party and Council of Ministers. In 1990, Gorbachev introduced and assumed the position of the President of the Soviet Union, concentrated power in his executive office, independent of the party, and subordinated the government, now renamed the Cabinet of Ministers of the USSR, to himself.Tensions grew between the Union-wide authorities under Gorbachev, reformists led in Russia by Boris Yeltsin and controlling the newly elected Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR, and communist hardliners. On 19–21 August 1991, a group of hardliners staged a coup attempt. The coup failed, and the State Council of the Soviet Union became the highest organ of state power "in the period of transition". Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary, only remaining President for the final months of the existence of the USSR.The judiciary was not independent of the other branches of government. The Supreme Court supervised the lower courts (People's Court) and applied the law as established by the constitution or as interpreted by the Supreme Soviet. The Constitutional Oversight Committee reviewed the constitutionality of laws and acts. The Soviet Union used the inquisitorial system of Roman law, where the judge, procurator, and defence attorney collaborate to establish the truth.Constitutionally, the USSR was a federation of constituent Union Republics, which were either unitary states, such as Ukraine or Byelorussia (SSRs), or federations, such as Russia or Transcaucasia (SFSRs), all four being the founding republics who signed the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR in December 1922. In 1924, during the national delimitation in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were formed from parts of Russia's Turkestan ASSR and two Soviet dependencies, the Khorezm and Bukharan SSRs. In 1929, Tajikistan was split off from the Uzbekistan SSR. With the constitution of 1936, the Transcaucasian SFSR was dissolved, resulting in its constituent republics of Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan being elevated to Union Republics, while Kazakhstan and Kirghizia were split off from Russian SFSR, resulting in the same status. In August 1940, Moldavia was formed from parts of Ukraine and Bessarabia and northern Bukovina. Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (SSRs) were also admitted into the union which was not recognized by most of the international community and was considered an illegal occupation. Karelia was split off from Russia as a Union Republic in March 1940 and was reabsorbed in 1956. Between July 1956 and September 1991, there were 15 union republics (see map below).While nominally a union of equals, in practice the Soviet Union was dominated by Russians. The domination was so absolute that for most of its existence, the country was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to as "Russia". While the RSFSR was technically only one republic within the larger union, it was by far the largest (both in terms of population and area), most powerful, most developed, and the industrial center of the Soviet Union. Historian Matthew White wrote that it was an open secret that the country's federal structure was "window dressing" for Russian dominance. For that reason, the people of the USSR were usually called "Russians", not "Soviets", since "everyone knew who really ran the show".Under the Military Law of September 1925, the Soviet Armed Forces consisted of the Land Forces, the Air Force, the Navy, Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU), and the Internal Troops. The OGPU later became independent and in 1934 joined the NKVD, and so its internal troops were under the joint leadership of the defense and internal commissariats. After World War II, Strategic Missile Forces (1959), Air Defense Forces (1948) and National Civil Defense Forces (1970) were formed, which ranked first, third, and sixth in the official Soviet system of importance (ground forces were second, Air Force Fourth, and Navy Fifth).The army had the greatest political influence. In 1989, there served two million soldiers divided between 150 motorized and 52 armored divisions. Until the early 1960s, the Soviet navy was a rather small military branch, but after the Caribbean crisis, under the leadership of Sergei Gorshkov, it expanded significantly. It became known for battlecruisers and submarines. In 1989 there served 500 000 men. The Soviet Air Force focused on a fleet of strategic bombers and during war situation was to eradicate enemy infrastructure and nuclear capacity. The air force also had a number of fighters and tactical bombers to support the army in the war. Strategic missile forces had more than 1,400 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), deployed between 28 bases and 300 command centers.In the post-war period, the Soviet Army was directly involved in several military operations abroad. These included the suppression of the uprising in East Germany (1953), Hungarian revolution (1956) and the invasion of Czechoslovakia (1968). The Soviet Union also participated in the war in Afghanistan between 1979 and 1989.In the Soviet Union, general conscription applied.At the end of the 1950s, with the help of engineers and technologies captured and imported from defeated Nazi Germany, the Soviets constructed the first satellite – Sputnik 1 and thus overtook the United States in terms of utilizing space. This was followed by other successful satellites, where test dogs flight was sent. On April 12, 1961, the first cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin, was sent to the space. He once flew around the Earth and successfully landed in the Kazakh steppe. At that time, the first plans for space shuttles and orbital stations were drawn up in Soviet design offices, but in the end personal disputes between designers and management prevented this.As for Lunar space program; USSR only had a program on automated spacecraft launches; with no manned spacecraft used; passing on the "Moon Race" part of Space Race.In the 1970s, specific proposals for the design of the space shuttle began to emerge, but shortcomings, especially in the electronics industry (rapid overheating of electronics), postponed the program until the end of the 1980s. The first shuttle, the Buran, flew in 1988, but without a human crew. Another shuttle, "Ptichka", eventually ended up under construction, as the shuttle project was canceled in 1991. For their launch into space, there is today an unused superpower rocket, Energia, which is the most powerful in the world.In the late 1980s, the Soviet Union managed to build the "Mir" orbital station. It was built on the construction of "Salyut" stations and its only role was civilian-grade research tasks. The Soviet Union adopted a command economy, whereby production and distribution of goods were centralized and directed by the government. The first Bolshevik experience with a command economy was the policy of War communism, which involved the nationalization of industry, centralized distribution of output, coercive requisition of agricultural production, and attempts to eliminate money circulation, private enterprises and free trade. After the severe economic collapse, Lenin replaced war communism by the New Economic Policy (NEP) in 1921, legalizing free trade and private ownership of small businesses. The economy quickly recovered as a result.After a long debate among the members of the Politburo about the course of economic development, by 1928–1929, upon gaining control of the country, Stalin abandoned the NEP and pushed for full central planning, starting forced collectivization of agriculture and enacting draconian labor legislation. Resources were mobilized for rapid industrialization, which significantly expanded Soviet capacity in heavy industry and capital goods during the 1930s. The primary motivation for industrialization was preparation for war, mostly due to distrust of the outside capitalist world. As a result, the USSR was transformed from a largely agrarian economy into a great industrial power, leading the way for its emergence as a superpower after World War II. The war caused extensive devastation of the Soviet economy and infrastructure, which required massive reconstruction.By the early 1940s, the Soviet economy had become relatively self-sufficient; for most of the period until the creation of Comecon, only a tiny share of domestic products was traded internationally. After the creation of the Eastern Bloc, external trade rose rapidly. However, the influence of the world economy on the USSR was limited by fixed domestic prices and a state monopoly on foreign trade. Grain and sophisticated consumer manufactures became major import articles from around the 1960s. During the arms race of the Cold War, the Soviet economy was burdened by military expenditures, heavily lobbied for by a powerful bureaucracy dependent on the arms industry. At the same time, the USSR became the largest arms exporter to the Third World. Significant amounts of Soviet resources during the Cold War were allocated in aid to the other socialist states.From the 1930s until its dissolution in late 1991, the way the Soviet economy operated remained essentially unchanged. The economy was formally directed by central planning, carried out by Gosplan and organized in five-year plans. However, in practice, the plans were highly aggregated and provisional, subject to "ad hoc" intervention by superiors. All critical economic decisions were taken by the political leadership. Allocated resources and plan targets were usually denominated in rubles rather than in physical goods. Credit was discouraged, but widespread. The final allocation of output was achieved through relatively decentralized, unplanned contracting. Although in theory prices were legally set from above, in practice they were often negotiated, and informal horizontal links (e.g. between producer factories) were widespread.A number of basic services were state-funded, such as education and health care. In the manufacturing sector, heavy industry and defence were prioritized over consumer goods. Consumer goods, particularly outside large cities, were often scarce, of poor quality and limited variety. Under the command economy, consumers had almost no influence on production, and the changing demands of a population with growing incomes could not be satisfied by supplies at rigidly fixed prices. A massive unplanned second economy grew up at low levels alongside the planned one, providing some of the goods and services that the planners could not. The legalization of some elements of the decentralized economy was attempted with the reform of 1965.Although statistics of the Soviet economy are notoriously unreliable and its economic growth difficult to estimate precisely, by most accounts, the economy continued to expand until the mid-1980s. During the 1950s and 1960s, it had comparatively high growth and was catching up to the West. However, after 1970, the growth, while still positive, steadily declined much more quickly and consistently than in other countries, despite a rapid increase in the capital stock (the rate of capital increase was only surpassed by Japan).Overall, the growth rate of per capita income in the Soviet Union between 1960 and 1989 was slightly above the world average (based on 102 countries). According to Stanley Fischer and William Easterly, growth could have been faster. By their calculation, per capita income in 1989 should have been twice higher than it was, considering the amount of investment, education and population. The authors attribute this poor performance to the low productivity of capital. Steven Rosenfielde states that the standard of living declined due to Stalin's despotism. While there was a brief improvement after his death, it lapsed into stagnation.In 1987, Mikhail Gorbachev attempted to reform and revitalize the economy with his program of "perestroika". His policies relaxed state control over enterprises but did not replace it by market incentives, resulting in a sharp decline in output. The economy, already suffering from reduced petroleum export revenues, started to collapse. Prices were still fixed, and the property was still largely state-owned until after the country's dissolution. For most of the period after World War II until its collapse, Soviet GDP (PPP) was the second-largest in the world, and third during the second half of the 1980s, although on a per-capita basis, it was behind that of First World countries. Compared to countries with similar per-capita GDP in 1928, the Soviet Union experienced significant growth.In 1990, the country had a Human Development Index of 0.920, placing it in the "high" category of human development. It was the third-highest in the Eastern Bloc, behind Czechoslovakia and East Germany, and the 25th in the world of 130 countries.The need for fuel declined in the Soviet Union from the 1970s to the 1980s, both per ruble of gross social product and per ruble of industrial product. At the start, this decline grew very rapidly but gradually slowed down between 1970 and 1975. From 1975 and 1980, it grew even slower, only 2.6%. David Wilson, a historian, believed that the gas industry would account for 40% of Soviet fuel production by the end of the century. His theory did not come to fruition because of the USSR's collapse. The USSR, in theory, would have continued to have an economic growth rate of 2–2.5% during the 1990s because of Soviet energy fields. However, the energy sector faced many difficulties, among them the country's high military expenditure and hostile relations with the First World.In 1991, the Soviet Union had a pipeline network of for crude oil and another for natural gas. Petroleum and petroleum-based products, natural gas, metals, wood, agricultural products, and a variety of manufactured goods, primarily machinery, arms and military equipment, were exported. In the 1970s and 1980s, the USSR heavily relied on fossil fuel exports to earn hard currency. At its peak in 1988, it was the largest producer and second-largest exporter of crude oil, surpassed only by Saudi Arabia.The Soviet Union placed great emphasis on science and technology within its economy, however, the most remarkable Soviet successes in technology, such as producing the world's first space satellite, typically were the responsibility of the military. Lenin believed that the USSR would never overtake the developed world if it remained as technologically backward as it was upon its founding. Soviet authorities proved their commitment to Lenin's belief by developing massive networks, research and development organizations. In the early 1960s, the Soviets awarded 40% of chemistry PhDs to women, compared to only 5% in the United States. By 1989, Soviet scientists were among the world's best-trained specialists in several areas, such as energy physics, selected areas of medicine, mathematics, welding and military technologies. Due to rigid state planning and bureaucracy, the Soviets remained far behind technologically in chemistry, biology, and computers when compared to the First World.Under the Reagan administration, Project Socrates determined that the Soviet Union addressed the acquisition of science and technology in a manner that was radically different from what the US was using. In the case of the US, economic prioritization was being used for indigenous research and development as the means to acquire science and technology in both the private and public sectors. In contrast, the USSR was offensively and defensively maneuvering in the acquisition and utilization of the worldwide technology, to increase the competitive advantage that they acquired from the technology while preventing the US from acquiring a competitive advantage. However, technology-based planning was executed in a centralized, government-centric manner that greatly hindered its flexibility. This was exploited by the US to undermine the strength of the Soviet Union and thus foster its reform.Transport was a vital component of the country's economy. The economic centralization of the late 1920s and 1930s led to the development of infrastructure on a massive scale, most notably the establishment of Aeroflot, an aviation enterprise. The country had a wide variety of modes of transport by land, water and air. However, due to inadequate maintenance, much of the road, water and Soviet civil aviation transport were outdated and technologically backward compared to the First World.Soviet rail transport was the largest and most intensively used in the world; it was also better developed than most of its Western counterparts. By the late 1970s and early 1980s, Soviet economists were calling for the construction of more roads to alleviate some of the burdens from the railways and to improve the Soviet government budget. The street network and automotive industry remained underdeveloped, and dirt roads were common outside major cities. Soviet maintenance projects proved unable to take care of even the few roads the country had. By the early-to-mid-1980s, the Soviet authorities tried to solve the road problem by ordering the construction of new ones. Meanwhile, the automobile industry was growing at a faster rate than road construction. The underdeveloped road network led to a growing demand for public transport.Despite improvements, several aspects of the transport sector were still riddled with problems due to outdated infrastructure, lack of investment, corruption and bad decision-making. Soviet authorities were unable to meet the growing demand for transport infrastructure and services.The Soviet merchant navy was one of the largest in the world.Excess deaths throughout World War I and the Russian Civil War (including the postwar famine) amounted to a combined total of 18 million, some 10 million in the 1930s, and more than 26 million in 1941–5. The postwar Soviet population was 45 to 50 million smaller than it would have been if pre-war demographic growth had continued. According to Catherine Merridale, "... reasonable estimate would place the total number of excess deaths for the whole period somewhere around 60 million."The birth rate of the USSR decreased from 44.0 per thousand in 1926 to 18.0 in 1974, mainly due to increasing urbanization and the rising average age of marriages. The mortality rate demonstrated a gradual decrease as well – from 23.7 per thousand in 1926 to 8.7 in 1974. In general, the birth rates of the southern republics in Transcaucasia and Central Asia were considerably higher than those in the northern parts of the Soviet Union, and in some cases even increased in the post–World War II period, a phenomenon partly attributed to slower rates of urbanistion and traditionally earlier marriages in the southern republics. Soviet Europe moved towards sub-replacement fertility, while Soviet Central Asia continued to exhibit population growth well above replacement-level fertility.The late 1960s and the 1970s witnessed a reversal of the declining trajectory of the rate of mortality in the USSR, and was especially notable among men of working age, but was also prevalent in Russia and other predominantly Slavic areas of the country. An analysis of the official data from the late 1980s showed that after worsening in the late-1970s and the early 1980s, adult mortality began to improve again. The infant mortality rate increased from 24.7 in 1970 to 27.9 in 1974. Some researchers regarded the rise as mostly real, a consequence of worsening health conditions and services. The rises in both adult and infant mortality were not explained or defended by Soviet officials, and the Soviet government stopped publishing all mortality statistics for ten years. Soviet demographers and health specialists remained silent about the mortality increases until the late-1980s, when the publication of mortality data resumed, and researchers could delve into the real causes.Under Lenin, the state made explicit commitments to promote the equality of men and women. Many early Russian feminists and ordinary Russian working women actively participated in the Revolution, and many more were affected by the events of that period and the new policies. Beginning in October 1918, Lenin's government liberalized divorce and abortion laws, decriminalized homosexuality (re-criminalized in the 1930s), permitted cohabitation, and ushered in a host of reforms. However, without birth control, the new system produced many broken marriages, as well as countless out-of-wedlock children. The epidemic of divorces and extramarital affairs created social hardships when Soviet leaders wanted people to concentrate their efforts on growing the economy. Giving women control over their fertility also led to a precipitous decline in the birth rate, perceived as a threat to their country's military power. By 1936, Stalin reversed most of the liberal laws, ushering in a pronatalist era that lasted for decades.By 1917, Russia became the first great power to grant women the right to vote. After heavy casualties in World War I and II, women outnumbered men in Russia by a 4:3 ratio. This contributed to the larger role women played in Russian society compared to other great powers at the time.Anatoly Lunacharsky became the first People's Commissar for Education of Soviet Russia. In the beginning, the Soviet authorities placed great emphasis on the elimination of illiteracy. All left-handed children were forced to write with their right hand in the Soviet school system. Literate people were automatically hired as teachers. For a short period, quality was sacrificed for quantity. By 1940, Stalin could announce that illiteracy had been eliminated. Throughout the 1930s, social mobility rose sharply, which has been attributed to reforms in education. In the aftermath of World War II, the country's educational system expanded dramatically, which had a tremendous effect. In the 1960s, nearly all children had access to education, the only exception being those living in remote areas. Nikita Khrushchev tried to make education more accessible, making it clear to children that education was closely linked to the needs of society. Education also became important in giving rise to the New Man. Citizens directly entering the workforce had the constitutional right to a job and to free vocational training.The education system was highly centralized and universally accessible to all citizens, with affirmative action for applicants from nations associated with cultural backwardness. However, as part of the general antisemitic policy, an unofficial Jewish quota was applied in the leading institutions of higher education by subjecting Jewish applicants to harsher entrance examinations. The Brezhnev era also introduced a rule that required all university applicants to present a reference from the local Komsomol party secretary. According to statistics from 1986, the number of higher education students per the population of 10,000 was 181 for the USSR, compared to 517 for the US.The Soviet Union was an ethnically diverse country, with more than 100 distinct ethnic groups. The total population of the country was estimated at 293 million in 1991. According to a 1990 estimate, the majority of the population were Russians (50.78%), followed by Ukrainians (15.45%) and Uzbeks (5.84%).All citizens of the USSR had their own ethnic affiliation. The ethnicity of a person was chosen at the age of sixteen by the child's parents. If the parents did not agree, the child was automatically assigned the ethnicity of the father. Partly due to Soviet policies, some of the smaller minority ethnic groups were considered part of larger ones, such as the Mingrelians of Georgia, who were classified with the linguistically related Georgians. Some ethnic groups voluntarily assimilated, while others were brought in by force. Russians, Belarusians, and Ukrainians, who were all East Slavic and Orthodox, shared close cultural, ethnic, and religious ties, while other groups did not. With multiple nationalities living in the same territory, ethnic antagonisms developed over the years.Members of various ethnicities participated in legislative bodies. Organs of power like the Politburo, the Secretariat of the Central Committee etc., were formally ethnically neutral, but in reality, ethnic Russians were overrepresented, although there were also non-Russian leaders in the Soviet leadership, such as Joseph Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev, Nikolai Podgorny or Andrei Gromyko. During the Soviet era, a significant number of ethnic Russians and Ukrainians migrated to other Soviet republics, and many of them settled there. According to the last census in 1989, the Russian "diaspora" in the Soviet republics had reached 25 million.In 1917, before the revolution, health conditions were significantly behind those of developed countries. As Lenin later noted, "Either the lice will defeat socialism, or socialism will defeat the lice". The Soviet principle of health care was conceived by the People's Commissariat for Health in 1918. Health care was to be controlled by the state and would be provided to its citizens free of charge, a revolutionary concept at the time. Article 42 of the 1977 Soviet Constitution gave all citizens the right to health protection and free access to any health institutions in the USSR. Before Leonid Brezhnev became General Secretary, the Soviet healthcare system was held in high esteem by many foreign specialists. This changed, however, from Brezhnev's accession and Mikhail Gorbachev's tenure as leader, during which the health care system was heavily criticized for many basic faults, such as the quality of service and the unevenness in its provision. Minister of Health Yevgeniy Chazov, during the 19th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, while highlighting such successes as having the most doctors and hospitals in the world, recognized the system's areas for improvement and felt that billions of Soviet rubles were squandered. After the revolution, life expectancy for all age groups went up. This statistic in itself was seen by some that the socialist system was superior to the capitalist system. These improvements continued into the 1960s when statistics indicated that the life expectancy briefly surpassed that of the United States. Life expectancy started to decline in the 1970s, possibly because of alcohol abuse. At the same time, infant mortality began to rise. After 1974, the government stopped publishing statistics on the matter. This trend can be partly explained by the number of pregnancies rising drastically in the Asian part of the country where infant mortality was the highest while declining markedly in the more developed European part of the Soviet Union.Soviet dental technology and dental health were considered notoriously bad. In 1991, the average 35-year-old had 12 to 14 cavities, fillings or missing teeth. Toothpaste was often not available, and toothbrushes did not conform to standards of modern dentistry.Under Lenin, the government gave small language groups their own writing systems. The development of these writing systems was highly successful, even though some flaws were detected. During the later days of the USSR, countries with the same multilingual situation implemented similar policies. A serious problem when creating these writing systems was that the languages differed dialectally greatly from each other. When a language had been given a writing system and appeared in a notable publication, it would attain "official language" status. There were many minority languages which never received their own writing system; therefore, their speakers were forced to have a second language. There are examples where the government retreated from this policy, most notably under Stalin where education was discontinued in languages that were not widespread. These languages were then assimilated into another language, mostly Russian. During World War II, some minority languages were banned, and their speakers accused of collaborating with the enemy.As the most widely spoken of the Soviet Union's many languages, Russian "de facto" functioned as an official language, as the "language of interethnic communication" (), but only assumed the "de jure" status as the official national language in 1990.Christianity and Islam had the highest number of adherents among the religious citizens. Eastern Christianity predominated among Christians, with Russia's traditional Russian Orthodox Church being the largest Christian denomination. About 90% of the Soviet Union's Muslims were Sunnis, with Shias being concentrated in the Azerbaijan SSR. Smaller groups included Roman Catholics, Jews, Buddhists, and a variety of Protestant denominations (especially Baptists and Lutherans).Religious influence had been strong in the Russian Empire. The Russian Orthodox Church enjoyed a privileged status as the church of the monarchy and took part in carrying out official state functions. The immediate period following the establishment of the Soviet state included a struggle against the Orthodox Church, which the revolutionaries considered an ally of the former ruling classes.In Soviet law, the "freedom to hold religious services" was constitutionally guaranteed, although the ruling Communist Party regarded religion as incompatible with the Marxist spirit of scientific materialism. In practice, the Soviet system subscribed to a narrow interpretation of this right, and in fact utilized a range of official measures to discourage religion and curb the activities of religious groups.The 1918 Council of People's Commissars decree establishing the Russian SFSR as a secular state also decreed that "the teaching of religion in all [places] where subjects of general instruction are taught, is forbidden. Citizens may teach and may be taught religion privately." Among further restrictions, those adopted in 1929 included express prohibitions on a range of church activities, including meetings for organized Bible study. Both Christian and non-Christian establishments were shut down by the thousands in the 1920s and 1930s. By 1940, as many as 90% of the churches, synagogues, and mosques that had been operating in 1917 were closed.Under the doctrine of state atheism, a "government-sponsored program of forced conversion to atheism" was conducted. The government targeted religions based on state interests, and while most organized religions were never outlawed, religious property was confiscated, believers were harassed, and religion was ridiculed while atheism was propagated in schools. In 1925, the government founded the League of Militant Atheists to intensify the propaganda campaign. Accordingly, although personal expressions of religious faith were not explicitly banned, a strong sense of social stigma was imposed on them by the formal structures and mass media, and it was generally considered unacceptable for members of certain professions (teachers, state bureaucrats, soldiers) to be openly religious. While persecution accelerated following Stalin's rise to power, a revival of Orthodoxy was fostered by the government during World War II and the Soviet authorities sought to control the Russian Orthodox Church rather than liquidate it. During the first five years of Soviet power, the Bolsheviks executed 28 Russian Orthodox bishops and over 1,200 Russian Orthodox priests. Many others were imprisoned or exiled. Believers were harassed and persecuted. Most seminaries were closed, and the publication of most religious material was prohibited. By 1941, only 500 churches remained open out of about 54,000 in existence before World War I.Convinced that religious anti-Sovietism had become a thing of the past, and with the looming threat of war, the Stalin regime began shifting to a more moderate religion policy in the late 1930s. Soviet religious establishments overwhelmingly rallied to support the war effort during World War II. Amid other accommodations to religious faith after the German invasion, churches were reopened. Radio Moscow began broadcasting a religious hour, and a historic meeting between Stalin and Orthodox Church leader Patriarch Sergius of Moscow was held in 1943. Stalin had the support of the majority of the religious people in the USSR even through the late 1980s. The general tendency of this period was an increase in religious activity among believers of all faiths.Under Nikita Khrushchev, the state leadership clashed with the churches in 1958–1964, a period when atheism was emphasized in the educational curriculum, and numerous state publications promoted atheistic views. During this period, the number of churches fell from 20,000 to 10,000 from 1959 to 1965, and the number of synagogues dropped from 500 to 97. The number of working mosques also declined, falling from 1,500 to 500 within a decade.Religious institutions remained monitored by the Soviet government, but churches, synagogues, temples, and mosques were all given more leeway in the Brezhnev era. Official relations between the Orthodox Church and the government again warmed to the point that the Brezhnev government twice honored Orthodox Patriarch Alexy I with the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. A poll conducted by Soviet authorities in 1982 recorded 20% of the Soviet population as "active religious believers."The legacy of the USSR remains a controversial topic. The socio-economic nature of communist states such as the USSR, especially under Stalin, has also been much debated, varyingly being labelled a form of bureaucratic collectivism, state capitalism, state socialism, or a totally unique mode of production.The USSR implemented a broad range of policies over a long period of time, with a large amount of conflicting policies being implemented by different leaders. Some have a positive view of it whilst others are critical towards the country, calling it a repressive oligarchy. The opinions on the USSR are complex and have changed over time, with different generations having different views on the matter as well as on Soviet policies corresponding to separate time periods during its history. Leftists have largely varying views on the USSR. Whilst some leftists such as anarchists and other libertarian socialists, agree it did not give the workers control over the means of production and was a centralized oligarchy, others have more positive opinions as to the Bolshevik policies and Vladimir Lenin. Many anti-Stalinist leftists such as anarchists are extremely critical of Soviet authoritarianism and repression. Much of the criticism it receives is centered around massacres in the Soviet Union, the centralized hierarchy present in the USSR and mass political repression as well as violence towards government critics and political dissidents such as other leftists. Critics also point towards its failure to implement any substantial worker cooperatives or implementing worker liberation as well as corruption and the Soviet authoritarian nature.Many Russians and other former Soviet citizens have nostalgia for the USSR, pointing towards most infrastructure being built during Soviet times, increased job security, increased literacy rate, increased caloric intake and supposed ethnic pluralism enacted in the Soviet Union as well as political stability. The Russian Revolution is also seen in a positive light as well as the leadership of Lenin, Nikita Khrushchev and the later USSR, although many view Joseph Stalin's rule as positive for the country. In Armenia, 12% of respondents said the USSR collapse did good, while 66% said it did harm. In Kyrgyzstan, 16% of respondents said the collapse of the USSR did good, while 61% said it did harm. In a 2018 Rating Sociological Group poll, 47% of Ukrainian respondents had a positive opinion of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev, who ruled the Soviet Union from 1964 to 1982. Much of the admiration of the USSR comes from the failings of the modern post-Soviet governments such as the control by oligarchs, corruption and outdated Soviet-era infrastructure as well as the rise and dominance of organised crime after the collapse of the USSR all directly leading into nostalgia for it.The 1941–45 period of World War II is still known in Russia as the "Great Patriotic War". The war became a topic of great importance in cinema, literature, history lessons at school, the mass media, and the arts. As a result of the massive losses suffered by the military and civilians during the conflict, Victory Day celebrated on 9 May is still one of the most important and emotional dates in Russia.In some post Soviet republics, there is a more negative view of the USSR, although there is no unanimity on the matter. In large part due to the Holodomor, ethnic Ukrainians have a negative view of it. Russian-speaking Ukrainians of Ukraine's southern and eastern regions have a more positive view of the USSR. In some countries with internal conflict, there is also nostalgia for the USSR, especially for refugees of the post-Soviet conflicts who have been forced to flee their homes and have been displaced. This nostalgia is less an admiration for the country or its policies than it is a longing to return to their homes and not to live in poverty. The many Russian enclaves in the former USSR republics such as Transnistria have in a general a positive remembrance of it.The left's view of the USSR is complex. While some leftists regard the USSR as an example of state capitalism or that it was an oligarchical state, other leftists admire Vladimir Lenin and the Russian Revolution.Council communists generally view the USSR as failing to create class consciousness, turning into a corrupt state in which the elite controlled society. Anarchists are critical of the country, labeling the Soviet system as "red fascism". Soviets actively destroyed anarchist organizations and anarchist communities, labeling anarchists as "enemies of the people". Factors contributing to the animosity towards the USSR included: the Soviet invasion of the anarchist Free Territory, the suppression of the anarchist Kronstadt rebellion and the response to the Norilsk uprising, in which prisoners created a radical system of government based on cooperatives and direct democracy in the Gulag. Anarchist organizations and unions were also banned during the Spanish Civil War under the Republican government by orders from the Soviet government. Due to this, anarchists generally hold a large animosity towards the USSR.The culture of the Soviet Union passed through several stages during the USSR's existence. During the first decade following the revolution, there was relative freedom and artists experimented with several different styles to find a distinctive Soviet style of art. Lenin wanted art to be accessible to the Russian people. On the other hand, hundreds of intellectuals, writers, and artists were exiled or executed, and their work banned, such as Nikolay Gumilyov who was shot for alleged conspiring against the Bolshevik regime, and Yevgeny Zamyatin.The government encouraged a variety of trends. In art and literature, numerous schools, some traditional and others radically experimental, proliferated. Communist writers Maxim Gorky and Vladimir Mayakovsky were active during this time. As a means of influencing a largely illiterate society, films received encouragement from the state, and much of director Sergei Eisenstein's best work dates from this period.During Stalin's rule, the Soviet culture was characterized by the rise and domination of the government-imposed style of socialist realism, with all other trends being severely repressed, with rare exceptions, such as Mikhail Bulgakov's works. Many writers were imprisoned and killed.Following the Khrushchev Thaw, censorship was diminished. During this time, a distinctive period of Soviet culture developed, characterized by conformist public life and an intense focus on personal life. Greater experimentation in art forms was again permissible, resulting in the production of more sophisticated and subtly critical work. The regime loosened its emphasis on socialist realism; thus, for instance, many protagonists of the novels of author Yury Trifonov concerned themselves with problems of daily life rather than with building socialism. Underground dissident literature, known as "samizdat", developed during this late period. In architecture, the Khrushchev era mostly focused on functional design as opposed to the highly decorated style of Stalin's epoch. In music, in response to the increasing popularity of forms of popular music like jazz in the West, many jazz orchestras were permitted throughout the USSR, notably the Melodiya Ensemble, named after the principle record label in the USSR.In the second half of the 1980s, Gorbachev's policies of "perestroika" and "glasnost" significantly expanded freedom of expression throughout the country in the media and the press.Founded on 20 July 1924 in Moscow, "Sovetsky Sport" was the first sports newspaper of the Soviet Union.The Soviet Olympic Committee formed on 21 April 1951, and the IOC recognized the new body in its 45th session. In the same year, when the Soviet representative Konstantin Andrianov became an IOC member, the USSR officially joined the Olympic Movement. The 1952 Summer Olympics in Helsinki thus became first Olympic Games for Soviet athletes. The Soviet Union was the biggest rival to the United States at the Summer Olympics, winning six of its nine appearances at the games and also topping the medal tally at the Winter Olympics six times. The Soviet Union's Olympics success has been attributed to its large investment in sports to demonstrate its superpower image and political influence on a global stage.The Soviet Union national ice hockey team won nearly every world championship and Olympic tournament between 1954 and 1991 and never failed to medal in any International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) tournament in which they competed.The advent of the state-sponsored "full-time amateur athlete" of the Eastern Bloc countries further eroded the ideology of the pure amateur, as it put the self-financed amateurs of the Western countries at a disadvantage. The Soviet Union entered teams of athletes who were all nominally students, soldiers, or working in a profession – in reality, the state paid many of these competitors to train on a full-time basis. Nevertheless, the IOC held to the traditional rules regarding amateurism.A 1989 report by a committee of the Australian Senate claimed that "there is hardly a medal winner at the Moscow Games, certainly not a gold medal winner...who is not on one sort of drug or another: usually several kinds. The Moscow Games might well have been called the Chemists' Games".A member of the IOC Medical Commission, Manfred Donike, privately ran additional tests with a new technique for identifying abnormal levels of testosterone by measuring its ratio to epitestosterone in urine. Twenty percent of the specimens he tested, including those from sixteen gold medalists, would have resulted in disciplinary proceedings had the tests been official. The results of Donike's unofficial tests later convinced the IOC to add his new technique to their testing protocols. The first documented case of "blood doping" occurred at the 1980 Summer Olympics when a runner was transfused with two pints of blood before winning medals in the 5000 m and 10,000 m.Documentation obtained in 2016 revealed the Soviet Union's plans for a statewide doping system in track and field in preparation for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. Dated before the decision to boycott the 1984 Games, the document detailed the existing steroids operations of the program, along with suggestions for further enhancements. Dr. Sergei Portugalov of the Institute for Physical Culture prepared the communication, directed to the Soviet Union's head of track and field. Portugalov later became one of the leading figures involved in the implementation of Russian doping before the 2016 Summer Olympics.Official Soviet environmental policy has always attached great importance to actions in which human beings actively improve nature. Lenin's quote "Communism is Soviet power and electrification of the country!" in many respects summarizes the focus on modernization and industrial development. During the first five-year plan in 1928, Stalin proceeded to industrialize the country at all costs. Values such as environmental and nature protection have been completely ignored in the struggle to create a modern industrial society. After Stalin's death, they focused more on environmental issues, but the basic perception of the value of environmental protection remained the same.The Soviet media has always focused on the vast expanse of land and the virtually indestructible natural resources. This made it feel that contamination and uncontrolled exploitation of nature were not a problem. The Soviet state also firmly believed that scientific and technological progress would solve all the problems. Official ideology said that under socialism environmental problems could easily be overcome, unlike capitalist countries, where they seemingly could not be solved. The Soviet authorities had an almost unwavering belief that man could transcend nature. However, when the authorities had to admit that there were environmental problems in the USSR in the 1980s, they explained the problems in such a way that socialism had not yet been fully developed; pollution in a socialist society was only a temporary anomaly that would have been resolved if socialism had developed.The Chernobyl disaster in 1986 was the first major accident at a civilian nuclear power plant. Unparalleled in the world, it resulted in a large number of radioactive isotopes being released into the atmosphere. Radioactive doses have scattered relatively far. 4,000 new cases of thyroid cancer were reported after the incident, but this led to a relatively low number of deaths (WHO data, 2005). However, the long-term effects of the accident are unknown. Another major accident is the Kyshtym disaster.After the fall of the USSR, it was discovered that the environmental problems were greater than what the Soviet authorities admitted. The Kola Peninsula was one of the places with clear problems. Around the industrial cities of Monchegorsk and Norilsk, where nickel, for example, is mined, all forests have been destroyed by contamination, while the northern and other parts of Russia have been affected by emissions. During the 1990s, people in the West were also interested in the radioactive hazards of nuclear facilities, decommissioned nuclear submarines, and the processing of nuclear waste or spent nuclear fuel. It was also known in the early 1990s that the USSR had transported radioactive material to the Barents Sea and Kara Sea, which was later confirmed by the Russian parliament. The crash of the K-141 Kursk submarine in 2000 in the west further raised concerns. In the past, there were accidents involving submarines K-19, K-8, and K-129.
|
[
"Georgy Malenkov",
"Alexei Kosygin",
"Nikolai Ryzhkov",
"Joseph Stalin",
"Alexei Rykov",
"Ivan Silayev",
"Vladimir Lenin",
"Nikolai Bulganin",
"Nikolai Tikhonov",
"Vyacheslav Molotov",
"Valentin Pavlov"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team Valenciennes F.C. in Sep, 2021?
|
September 03, 2021
|
{
"text": [
"Olivier Guégan"
]
}
|
L2_Q212269_P286_0
|
Olivier Guégan is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2019 to Nov, 2021.
Christophe Delmotte is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Nov, 2021 to Jun, 2022.
Nicolas Rabuel is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
|
Valenciennes FCValenciennes Football Club (; commonly known as Valenciennes or USVA) is a French association football club based in Valenciennes. The club was founded in 1913 and currently play in Ligue 2, the second tier of French football. Valenciennes plays its home matches at the recently built Stade du Hainaut located within the city.Valenciennes was founded under the name Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA). The club spent over 80 years playing under the name before switching to its current name. Valenciennes has spent an equal amount of time playing in Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 having played 40 seasons in the first division and 36 seasons in the second division. The club has never won the first division, but has won Ligue 2 on two occasions. Valenciennes has also won the Championnat National and the Championnat de France amateur in 2005 and 1998, respectively. In 1951, the club made its first and only appearance in a Coupe de France final.From 2004 to 2011, Valenciennes was presided over by Francis Decourrière, a former politician who served as a Member of the European Parliament under the Social Democratic Party from 1994 to 1999 and later the "Union pour la Démocratie Française" ("Union for French Democracy") from 1999 to 2004. In 2011, Decourrière left the position and was replaced by Jean-Raymond Legrand.Valenciennes Football Club was founded in 1913 by a group of young men known by surnames Colson, Joly, and Bouly. Due to the club having limited resources and its formation coinciding with the onset of World War I, Valenciennes sought a consolidation between locals clubs in the city. The merger was completed in 1916 with the club changing its name to Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA) in the process. Following the merger, the new club spent the ensuing 15 years playing the "District de l'Escaut" Championship. In July 1930, the National Council of the French Football Federation voted 128–20 in support of professionalism in French football. Valenciennes, under the leadership of president M. Le Mithouard, achieved professionalism in 1933 and were inserted into the second division. The club, subsequently, became a founding member of the second division of French football.In the second division's inaugural season, Valenciennes finished in 7th place in its group. In the following season, the league table was converted into a single table and Valenciennes finished in 2nd-place position earning promotion to Division 1 as a result. During this period, the club was notably led by foreign players such as Englishmen Peter O'Dowd and George Gibson and the German-born attackers Édouard Waggi and Ignace Kowalczyk. In the club's first season in Division 1, Valenciennes finished 15th place falling back to Division 2. The club finished equal on points with Red Star Olympique, but due to having less wins and a lesser goal difference, Valenciennes were relegated. After suffering relegation, the club brought in a new president known by the surname of Turbot. Soon after arriving, Turbot released several of the club's international players and brought in the likes of Ernest Libérati to replace them. The transition was a success with the club earning promotion back to Division 1 in 1937. However, Valenciennes stint back in Division 1 was the equivalent of its first. The club finished in last place in the 1937–38 season and relegated back to Division 2. Due to World War II, Valenciennes reverted to amateur status and spent three of the six seasons in wartime playing amateur league football.After the war, Valenciennes turned professional again and were back in the second division. The club spent a decade in Division 2 before earning promotion the top-flight ahead of the 1956–57 season. Under manager Charles Demeillez, in 1951, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe de France. In the final, the club faced Strasbourg and were humbled 3–0 at the Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir in the Colombes. In the club's return to Division 1, Valenciennes finished in the latter part of the table for three consecutive seasons. In 1959, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe Drago, but were defeated 3–2 in extra time by Lens at the Parc des Princes. In the 1959–60 season, Valenciennes achieved its best finish in Division 1 after finishing 8th in the table. However, manager Robert Domergue was unable to keep the consistency as Valenciennes finished 19th in the following season. Valenciennes, now being led by youngsters Bolec Kocik and Serge Masnaghetti, achieved promotion back to Division 1 after one season and spent the next nine years playing in Division 1. During the stint, Domergue led to club to its highest finish ever in the first division when the club finished 3rd in back-to-back seasons in 1965 and 1966. After the 1966 season, Domergue departed the club and he was replaced by Gaby Robert. Neither Robert or his successor Louis Provelli could match the consistency of Domergue and he returned to the club in 1970. In the club's first season back, Domergue led the club to relegation in 1971, got the club promoted back to the first division in 1972, and coached the club to relegation again in 1973. He departed after the season and was replaced by Jean-Pierre Destrumelle.After spending the early 1970s hovering between top flight and the second division, Destrumelle led the club back to Division 1 for the 1975–76 season. The manager had vast majority of talent in the club, most notably Bruno Metsu, Bruno Zaremba, Dominique Dropsy, and Didier Six and kept the club in the first division for his entire campaign, however, after finishing in 18th place in 1979, Dustremelle was fired and replaced by the combination of Erwin Wilczek and Bolek Tomowski. Under the duo, Valenciennes lasted in Division 1 until the 1983 season. The club, subsequently, spent the next decade playing in Division 2 under five different managers, which led supporters to slowly become disassociated with the club.From 1988 to 1991, Valenciennes improved significantly under manager Georges Peyroche. Peyroche left the club in 1991 and Francis Smerecki was named as his replacement. In Smerecki's first season, he led the club back to Division 1. In the club's first season back, Valenciennes were involved in a bribing scandal that effectively dismantled the club for the next decade. The scandal, which involved Marseille midfielder Jean-Jacques Eydelie and the club's general manager under the advisement of club chairman Bernard Tapie bribing Valenciennes players Christophe Robert, Jacques Glassmann, and Jorge Burruchaga, became headline news mainly due to Marseille being the most popular club in the country. It was asserted that the bribe was made in order for Valenciennes players to "take it easy" on Marseille players with the latter club having to play in the 1993 UEFA Champions League Final against Italian club Milan just days later. Marseille beat Valenciennes 1–0 and went on to defeat Milan to become the first French club to win the European competition. After the plot was discovered, Robert admitted to accepting the bribe, Burruchaga admitted to initially agreeing to it, but later changing his mind, while Glassmann said he never agreed to the deal. The subsequent reports of the scandal completely tarnished the Valenciennes's image and several players departed the club amid embarrassment and speculation that they were also involved in the plot. With the club now playing in Ligue 2, Valenciennes was unable to cope with the damage instilled on it due to the scandal and finished dead last in the league, thus falling to the third division for the first time in the club's lifetime. Two seasons later, the club was relegated to the fourth division due to financial problems. Ahead of the 1996–97 season, the club dropped to amateur status after filing for bankruptcy.On 1 April 1996, the club was renamed Valenciennes Football Club and finished in fifth place in its inaugural campaign under the name. In the following season, the fourth division was renamed to the Championnat de France amateur and Valenciennes became inaugural champions of the league. Over the next seven seasons, Valenciennes played in the Championnat National, excluding one season back in the CFA. In the 2004–05 season, the club won National and returned to the second division, now called Ligue 2. Surprisingly, after one season, Valenciennes earned promotion back to the first division, now called Ligue 1, under the leadership of Antoine Kombouaré. After eight years in Ligue 1, the club was relegated to the second division in 2014. Because of this relegation, VAFC experienced financial problems and saw the return to the business of the former minister Jean-Louis Borloo. He saved the club from demotion to the fourth division.Below are the notable former players who have represented Valenciennes in league and international competition since the club's foundation in 1913."For a complete list of Valenciennes players, see ".
|
[
"Christophe Delmotte",
"Nicolas Rabuel"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team Valenciennes F.C. in 2021-09-03?
|
September 03, 2021
|
{
"text": [
"Olivier Guégan"
]
}
|
L2_Q212269_P286_0
|
Olivier Guégan is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2019 to Nov, 2021.
Christophe Delmotte is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Nov, 2021 to Jun, 2022.
Nicolas Rabuel is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
|
Valenciennes FCValenciennes Football Club (; commonly known as Valenciennes or USVA) is a French association football club based in Valenciennes. The club was founded in 1913 and currently play in Ligue 2, the second tier of French football. Valenciennes plays its home matches at the recently built Stade du Hainaut located within the city.Valenciennes was founded under the name Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA). The club spent over 80 years playing under the name before switching to its current name. Valenciennes has spent an equal amount of time playing in Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 having played 40 seasons in the first division and 36 seasons in the second division. The club has never won the first division, but has won Ligue 2 on two occasions. Valenciennes has also won the Championnat National and the Championnat de France amateur in 2005 and 1998, respectively. In 1951, the club made its first and only appearance in a Coupe de France final.From 2004 to 2011, Valenciennes was presided over by Francis Decourrière, a former politician who served as a Member of the European Parliament under the Social Democratic Party from 1994 to 1999 and later the "Union pour la Démocratie Française" ("Union for French Democracy") from 1999 to 2004. In 2011, Decourrière left the position and was replaced by Jean-Raymond Legrand.Valenciennes Football Club was founded in 1913 by a group of young men known by surnames Colson, Joly, and Bouly. Due to the club having limited resources and its formation coinciding with the onset of World War I, Valenciennes sought a consolidation between locals clubs in the city. The merger was completed in 1916 with the club changing its name to Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA) in the process. Following the merger, the new club spent the ensuing 15 years playing the "District de l'Escaut" Championship. In July 1930, the National Council of the French Football Federation voted 128–20 in support of professionalism in French football. Valenciennes, under the leadership of president M. Le Mithouard, achieved professionalism in 1933 and were inserted into the second division. The club, subsequently, became a founding member of the second division of French football.In the second division's inaugural season, Valenciennes finished in 7th place in its group. In the following season, the league table was converted into a single table and Valenciennes finished in 2nd-place position earning promotion to Division 1 as a result. During this period, the club was notably led by foreign players such as Englishmen Peter O'Dowd and George Gibson and the German-born attackers Édouard Waggi and Ignace Kowalczyk. In the club's first season in Division 1, Valenciennes finished 15th place falling back to Division 2. The club finished equal on points with Red Star Olympique, but due to having less wins and a lesser goal difference, Valenciennes were relegated. After suffering relegation, the club brought in a new president known by the surname of Turbot. Soon after arriving, Turbot released several of the club's international players and brought in the likes of Ernest Libérati to replace them. The transition was a success with the club earning promotion back to Division 1 in 1937. However, Valenciennes stint back in Division 1 was the equivalent of its first. The club finished in last place in the 1937–38 season and relegated back to Division 2. Due to World War II, Valenciennes reverted to amateur status and spent three of the six seasons in wartime playing amateur league football.After the war, Valenciennes turned professional again and were back in the second division. The club spent a decade in Division 2 before earning promotion the top-flight ahead of the 1956–57 season. Under manager Charles Demeillez, in 1951, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe de France. In the final, the club faced Strasbourg and were humbled 3–0 at the Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir in the Colombes. In the club's return to Division 1, Valenciennes finished in the latter part of the table for three consecutive seasons. In 1959, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe Drago, but were defeated 3–2 in extra time by Lens at the Parc des Princes. In the 1959–60 season, Valenciennes achieved its best finish in Division 1 after finishing 8th in the table. However, manager Robert Domergue was unable to keep the consistency as Valenciennes finished 19th in the following season. Valenciennes, now being led by youngsters Bolec Kocik and Serge Masnaghetti, achieved promotion back to Division 1 after one season and spent the next nine years playing in Division 1. During the stint, Domergue led to club to its highest finish ever in the first division when the club finished 3rd in back-to-back seasons in 1965 and 1966. After the 1966 season, Domergue departed the club and he was replaced by Gaby Robert. Neither Robert or his successor Louis Provelli could match the consistency of Domergue and he returned to the club in 1970. In the club's first season back, Domergue led the club to relegation in 1971, got the club promoted back to the first division in 1972, and coached the club to relegation again in 1973. He departed after the season and was replaced by Jean-Pierre Destrumelle.After spending the early 1970s hovering between top flight and the second division, Destrumelle led the club back to Division 1 for the 1975–76 season. The manager had vast majority of talent in the club, most notably Bruno Metsu, Bruno Zaremba, Dominique Dropsy, and Didier Six and kept the club in the first division for his entire campaign, however, after finishing in 18th place in 1979, Dustremelle was fired and replaced by the combination of Erwin Wilczek and Bolek Tomowski. Under the duo, Valenciennes lasted in Division 1 until the 1983 season. The club, subsequently, spent the next decade playing in Division 2 under five different managers, which led supporters to slowly become disassociated with the club.From 1988 to 1991, Valenciennes improved significantly under manager Georges Peyroche. Peyroche left the club in 1991 and Francis Smerecki was named as his replacement. In Smerecki's first season, he led the club back to Division 1. In the club's first season back, Valenciennes were involved in a bribing scandal that effectively dismantled the club for the next decade. The scandal, which involved Marseille midfielder Jean-Jacques Eydelie and the club's general manager under the advisement of club chairman Bernard Tapie bribing Valenciennes players Christophe Robert, Jacques Glassmann, and Jorge Burruchaga, became headline news mainly due to Marseille being the most popular club in the country. It was asserted that the bribe was made in order for Valenciennes players to "take it easy" on Marseille players with the latter club having to play in the 1993 UEFA Champions League Final against Italian club Milan just days later. Marseille beat Valenciennes 1–0 and went on to defeat Milan to become the first French club to win the European competition. After the plot was discovered, Robert admitted to accepting the bribe, Burruchaga admitted to initially agreeing to it, but later changing his mind, while Glassmann said he never agreed to the deal. The subsequent reports of the scandal completely tarnished the Valenciennes's image and several players departed the club amid embarrassment and speculation that they were also involved in the plot. With the club now playing in Ligue 2, Valenciennes was unable to cope with the damage instilled on it due to the scandal and finished dead last in the league, thus falling to the third division for the first time in the club's lifetime. Two seasons later, the club was relegated to the fourth division due to financial problems. Ahead of the 1996–97 season, the club dropped to amateur status after filing for bankruptcy.On 1 April 1996, the club was renamed Valenciennes Football Club and finished in fifth place in its inaugural campaign under the name. In the following season, the fourth division was renamed to the Championnat de France amateur and Valenciennes became inaugural champions of the league. Over the next seven seasons, Valenciennes played in the Championnat National, excluding one season back in the CFA. In the 2004–05 season, the club won National and returned to the second division, now called Ligue 2. Surprisingly, after one season, Valenciennes earned promotion back to the first division, now called Ligue 1, under the leadership of Antoine Kombouaré. After eight years in Ligue 1, the club was relegated to the second division in 2014. Because of this relegation, VAFC experienced financial problems and saw the return to the business of the former minister Jean-Louis Borloo. He saved the club from demotion to the fourth division.Below are the notable former players who have represented Valenciennes in league and international competition since the club's foundation in 1913."For a complete list of Valenciennes players, see ".
|
[
"Christophe Delmotte",
"Nicolas Rabuel"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team Valenciennes F.C. in 03/09/2021?
|
September 03, 2021
|
{
"text": [
"Olivier Guégan"
]
}
|
L2_Q212269_P286_0
|
Olivier Guégan is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2019 to Nov, 2021.
Christophe Delmotte is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Nov, 2021 to Jun, 2022.
Nicolas Rabuel is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
|
Valenciennes FCValenciennes Football Club (; commonly known as Valenciennes or USVA) is a French association football club based in Valenciennes. The club was founded in 1913 and currently play in Ligue 2, the second tier of French football. Valenciennes plays its home matches at the recently built Stade du Hainaut located within the city.Valenciennes was founded under the name Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA). The club spent over 80 years playing under the name before switching to its current name. Valenciennes has spent an equal amount of time playing in Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 having played 40 seasons in the first division and 36 seasons in the second division. The club has never won the first division, but has won Ligue 2 on two occasions. Valenciennes has also won the Championnat National and the Championnat de France amateur in 2005 and 1998, respectively. In 1951, the club made its first and only appearance in a Coupe de France final.From 2004 to 2011, Valenciennes was presided over by Francis Decourrière, a former politician who served as a Member of the European Parliament under the Social Democratic Party from 1994 to 1999 and later the "Union pour la Démocratie Française" ("Union for French Democracy") from 1999 to 2004. In 2011, Decourrière left the position and was replaced by Jean-Raymond Legrand.Valenciennes Football Club was founded in 1913 by a group of young men known by surnames Colson, Joly, and Bouly. Due to the club having limited resources and its formation coinciding with the onset of World War I, Valenciennes sought a consolidation between locals clubs in the city. The merger was completed in 1916 with the club changing its name to Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA) in the process. Following the merger, the new club spent the ensuing 15 years playing the "District de l'Escaut" Championship. In July 1930, the National Council of the French Football Federation voted 128–20 in support of professionalism in French football. Valenciennes, under the leadership of president M. Le Mithouard, achieved professionalism in 1933 and were inserted into the second division. The club, subsequently, became a founding member of the second division of French football.In the second division's inaugural season, Valenciennes finished in 7th place in its group. In the following season, the league table was converted into a single table and Valenciennes finished in 2nd-place position earning promotion to Division 1 as a result. During this period, the club was notably led by foreign players such as Englishmen Peter O'Dowd and George Gibson and the German-born attackers Édouard Waggi and Ignace Kowalczyk. In the club's first season in Division 1, Valenciennes finished 15th place falling back to Division 2. The club finished equal on points with Red Star Olympique, but due to having less wins and a lesser goal difference, Valenciennes were relegated. After suffering relegation, the club brought in a new president known by the surname of Turbot. Soon after arriving, Turbot released several of the club's international players and brought in the likes of Ernest Libérati to replace them. The transition was a success with the club earning promotion back to Division 1 in 1937. However, Valenciennes stint back in Division 1 was the equivalent of its first. The club finished in last place in the 1937–38 season and relegated back to Division 2. Due to World War II, Valenciennes reverted to amateur status and spent three of the six seasons in wartime playing amateur league football.After the war, Valenciennes turned professional again and were back in the second division. The club spent a decade in Division 2 before earning promotion the top-flight ahead of the 1956–57 season. Under manager Charles Demeillez, in 1951, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe de France. In the final, the club faced Strasbourg and were humbled 3–0 at the Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir in the Colombes. In the club's return to Division 1, Valenciennes finished in the latter part of the table for three consecutive seasons. In 1959, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe Drago, but were defeated 3–2 in extra time by Lens at the Parc des Princes. In the 1959–60 season, Valenciennes achieved its best finish in Division 1 after finishing 8th in the table. However, manager Robert Domergue was unable to keep the consistency as Valenciennes finished 19th in the following season. Valenciennes, now being led by youngsters Bolec Kocik and Serge Masnaghetti, achieved promotion back to Division 1 after one season and spent the next nine years playing in Division 1. During the stint, Domergue led to club to its highest finish ever in the first division when the club finished 3rd in back-to-back seasons in 1965 and 1966. After the 1966 season, Domergue departed the club and he was replaced by Gaby Robert. Neither Robert or his successor Louis Provelli could match the consistency of Domergue and he returned to the club in 1970. In the club's first season back, Domergue led the club to relegation in 1971, got the club promoted back to the first division in 1972, and coached the club to relegation again in 1973. He departed after the season and was replaced by Jean-Pierre Destrumelle.After spending the early 1970s hovering between top flight and the second division, Destrumelle led the club back to Division 1 for the 1975–76 season. The manager had vast majority of talent in the club, most notably Bruno Metsu, Bruno Zaremba, Dominique Dropsy, and Didier Six and kept the club in the first division for his entire campaign, however, after finishing in 18th place in 1979, Dustremelle was fired and replaced by the combination of Erwin Wilczek and Bolek Tomowski. Under the duo, Valenciennes lasted in Division 1 until the 1983 season. The club, subsequently, spent the next decade playing in Division 2 under five different managers, which led supporters to slowly become disassociated with the club.From 1988 to 1991, Valenciennes improved significantly under manager Georges Peyroche. Peyroche left the club in 1991 and Francis Smerecki was named as his replacement. In Smerecki's first season, he led the club back to Division 1. In the club's first season back, Valenciennes were involved in a bribing scandal that effectively dismantled the club for the next decade. The scandal, which involved Marseille midfielder Jean-Jacques Eydelie and the club's general manager under the advisement of club chairman Bernard Tapie bribing Valenciennes players Christophe Robert, Jacques Glassmann, and Jorge Burruchaga, became headline news mainly due to Marseille being the most popular club in the country. It was asserted that the bribe was made in order for Valenciennes players to "take it easy" on Marseille players with the latter club having to play in the 1993 UEFA Champions League Final against Italian club Milan just days later. Marseille beat Valenciennes 1–0 and went on to defeat Milan to become the first French club to win the European competition. After the plot was discovered, Robert admitted to accepting the bribe, Burruchaga admitted to initially agreeing to it, but later changing his mind, while Glassmann said he never agreed to the deal. The subsequent reports of the scandal completely tarnished the Valenciennes's image and several players departed the club amid embarrassment and speculation that they were also involved in the plot. With the club now playing in Ligue 2, Valenciennes was unable to cope with the damage instilled on it due to the scandal and finished dead last in the league, thus falling to the third division for the first time in the club's lifetime. Two seasons later, the club was relegated to the fourth division due to financial problems. Ahead of the 1996–97 season, the club dropped to amateur status after filing for bankruptcy.On 1 April 1996, the club was renamed Valenciennes Football Club and finished in fifth place in its inaugural campaign under the name. In the following season, the fourth division was renamed to the Championnat de France amateur and Valenciennes became inaugural champions of the league. Over the next seven seasons, Valenciennes played in the Championnat National, excluding one season back in the CFA. In the 2004–05 season, the club won National and returned to the second division, now called Ligue 2. Surprisingly, after one season, Valenciennes earned promotion back to the first division, now called Ligue 1, under the leadership of Antoine Kombouaré. After eight years in Ligue 1, the club was relegated to the second division in 2014. Because of this relegation, VAFC experienced financial problems and saw the return to the business of the former minister Jean-Louis Borloo. He saved the club from demotion to the fourth division.Below are the notable former players who have represented Valenciennes in league and international competition since the club's foundation in 1913."For a complete list of Valenciennes players, see ".
|
[
"Christophe Delmotte",
"Nicolas Rabuel"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team Valenciennes F.C. in Sep 03, 2021?
|
September 03, 2021
|
{
"text": [
"Olivier Guégan"
]
}
|
L2_Q212269_P286_0
|
Olivier Guégan is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2019 to Nov, 2021.
Christophe Delmotte is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Nov, 2021 to Jun, 2022.
Nicolas Rabuel is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
|
Valenciennes FCValenciennes Football Club (; commonly known as Valenciennes or USVA) is a French association football club based in Valenciennes. The club was founded in 1913 and currently play in Ligue 2, the second tier of French football. Valenciennes plays its home matches at the recently built Stade du Hainaut located within the city.Valenciennes was founded under the name Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA). The club spent over 80 years playing under the name before switching to its current name. Valenciennes has spent an equal amount of time playing in Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 having played 40 seasons in the first division and 36 seasons in the second division. The club has never won the first division, but has won Ligue 2 on two occasions. Valenciennes has also won the Championnat National and the Championnat de France amateur in 2005 and 1998, respectively. In 1951, the club made its first and only appearance in a Coupe de France final.From 2004 to 2011, Valenciennes was presided over by Francis Decourrière, a former politician who served as a Member of the European Parliament under the Social Democratic Party from 1994 to 1999 and later the "Union pour la Démocratie Française" ("Union for French Democracy") from 1999 to 2004. In 2011, Decourrière left the position and was replaced by Jean-Raymond Legrand.Valenciennes Football Club was founded in 1913 by a group of young men known by surnames Colson, Joly, and Bouly. Due to the club having limited resources and its formation coinciding with the onset of World War I, Valenciennes sought a consolidation between locals clubs in the city. The merger was completed in 1916 with the club changing its name to Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA) in the process. Following the merger, the new club spent the ensuing 15 years playing the "District de l'Escaut" Championship. In July 1930, the National Council of the French Football Federation voted 128–20 in support of professionalism in French football. Valenciennes, under the leadership of president M. Le Mithouard, achieved professionalism in 1933 and were inserted into the second division. The club, subsequently, became a founding member of the second division of French football.In the second division's inaugural season, Valenciennes finished in 7th place in its group. In the following season, the league table was converted into a single table and Valenciennes finished in 2nd-place position earning promotion to Division 1 as a result. During this period, the club was notably led by foreign players such as Englishmen Peter O'Dowd and George Gibson and the German-born attackers Édouard Waggi and Ignace Kowalczyk. In the club's first season in Division 1, Valenciennes finished 15th place falling back to Division 2. The club finished equal on points with Red Star Olympique, but due to having less wins and a lesser goal difference, Valenciennes were relegated. After suffering relegation, the club brought in a new president known by the surname of Turbot. Soon after arriving, Turbot released several of the club's international players and brought in the likes of Ernest Libérati to replace them. The transition was a success with the club earning promotion back to Division 1 in 1937. However, Valenciennes stint back in Division 1 was the equivalent of its first. The club finished in last place in the 1937–38 season and relegated back to Division 2. Due to World War II, Valenciennes reverted to amateur status and spent three of the six seasons in wartime playing amateur league football.After the war, Valenciennes turned professional again and were back in the second division. The club spent a decade in Division 2 before earning promotion the top-flight ahead of the 1956–57 season. Under manager Charles Demeillez, in 1951, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe de France. In the final, the club faced Strasbourg and were humbled 3–0 at the Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir in the Colombes. In the club's return to Division 1, Valenciennes finished in the latter part of the table for three consecutive seasons. In 1959, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe Drago, but were defeated 3–2 in extra time by Lens at the Parc des Princes. In the 1959–60 season, Valenciennes achieved its best finish in Division 1 after finishing 8th in the table. However, manager Robert Domergue was unable to keep the consistency as Valenciennes finished 19th in the following season. Valenciennes, now being led by youngsters Bolec Kocik and Serge Masnaghetti, achieved promotion back to Division 1 after one season and spent the next nine years playing in Division 1. During the stint, Domergue led to club to its highest finish ever in the first division when the club finished 3rd in back-to-back seasons in 1965 and 1966. After the 1966 season, Domergue departed the club and he was replaced by Gaby Robert. Neither Robert or his successor Louis Provelli could match the consistency of Domergue and he returned to the club in 1970. In the club's first season back, Domergue led the club to relegation in 1971, got the club promoted back to the first division in 1972, and coached the club to relegation again in 1973. He departed after the season and was replaced by Jean-Pierre Destrumelle.After spending the early 1970s hovering between top flight and the second division, Destrumelle led the club back to Division 1 for the 1975–76 season. The manager had vast majority of talent in the club, most notably Bruno Metsu, Bruno Zaremba, Dominique Dropsy, and Didier Six and kept the club in the first division for his entire campaign, however, after finishing in 18th place in 1979, Dustremelle was fired and replaced by the combination of Erwin Wilczek and Bolek Tomowski. Under the duo, Valenciennes lasted in Division 1 until the 1983 season. The club, subsequently, spent the next decade playing in Division 2 under five different managers, which led supporters to slowly become disassociated with the club.From 1988 to 1991, Valenciennes improved significantly under manager Georges Peyroche. Peyroche left the club in 1991 and Francis Smerecki was named as his replacement. In Smerecki's first season, he led the club back to Division 1. In the club's first season back, Valenciennes were involved in a bribing scandal that effectively dismantled the club for the next decade. The scandal, which involved Marseille midfielder Jean-Jacques Eydelie and the club's general manager under the advisement of club chairman Bernard Tapie bribing Valenciennes players Christophe Robert, Jacques Glassmann, and Jorge Burruchaga, became headline news mainly due to Marseille being the most popular club in the country. It was asserted that the bribe was made in order for Valenciennes players to "take it easy" on Marseille players with the latter club having to play in the 1993 UEFA Champions League Final against Italian club Milan just days later. Marseille beat Valenciennes 1–0 and went on to defeat Milan to become the first French club to win the European competition. After the plot was discovered, Robert admitted to accepting the bribe, Burruchaga admitted to initially agreeing to it, but later changing his mind, while Glassmann said he never agreed to the deal. The subsequent reports of the scandal completely tarnished the Valenciennes's image and several players departed the club amid embarrassment and speculation that they were also involved in the plot. With the club now playing in Ligue 2, Valenciennes was unable to cope with the damage instilled on it due to the scandal and finished dead last in the league, thus falling to the third division for the first time in the club's lifetime. Two seasons later, the club was relegated to the fourth division due to financial problems. Ahead of the 1996–97 season, the club dropped to amateur status after filing for bankruptcy.On 1 April 1996, the club was renamed Valenciennes Football Club and finished in fifth place in its inaugural campaign under the name. In the following season, the fourth division was renamed to the Championnat de France amateur and Valenciennes became inaugural champions of the league. Over the next seven seasons, Valenciennes played in the Championnat National, excluding one season back in the CFA. In the 2004–05 season, the club won National and returned to the second division, now called Ligue 2. Surprisingly, after one season, Valenciennes earned promotion back to the first division, now called Ligue 1, under the leadership of Antoine Kombouaré. After eight years in Ligue 1, the club was relegated to the second division in 2014. Because of this relegation, VAFC experienced financial problems and saw the return to the business of the former minister Jean-Louis Borloo. He saved the club from demotion to the fourth division.Below are the notable former players who have represented Valenciennes in league and international competition since the club's foundation in 1913."For a complete list of Valenciennes players, see ".
|
[
"Christophe Delmotte",
"Nicolas Rabuel"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team Valenciennes F.C. in 09/03/2021?
|
September 03, 2021
|
{
"text": [
"Olivier Guégan"
]
}
|
L2_Q212269_P286_0
|
Olivier Guégan is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2019 to Nov, 2021.
Christophe Delmotte is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Nov, 2021 to Jun, 2022.
Nicolas Rabuel is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
|
Valenciennes FCValenciennes Football Club (; commonly known as Valenciennes or USVA) is a French association football club based in Valenciennes. The club was founded in 1913 and currently play in Ligue 2, the second tier of French football. Valenciennes plays its home matches at the recently built Stade du Hainaut located within the city.Valenciennes was founded under the name Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA). The club spent over 80 years playing under the name before switching to its current name. Valenciennes has spent an equal amount of time playing in Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 having played 40 seasons in the first division and 36 seasons in the second division. The club has never won the first division, but has won Ligue 2 on two occasions. Valenciennes has also won the Championnat National and the Championnat de France amateur in 2005 and 1998, respectively. In 1951, the club made its first and only appearance in a Coupe de France final.From 2004 to 2011, Valenciennes was presided over by Francis Decourrière, a former politician who served as a Member of the European Parliament under the Social Democratic Party from 1994 to 1999 and later the "Union pour la Démocratie Française" ("Union for French Democracy") from 1999 to 2004. In 2011, Decourrière left the position and was replaced by Jean-Raymond Legrand.Valenciennes Football Club was founded in 1913 by a group of young men known by surnames Colson, Joly, and Bouly. Due to the club having limited resources and its formation coinciding with the onset of World War I, Valenciennes sought a consolidation between locals clubs in the city. The merger was completed in 1916 with the club changing its name to Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA) in the process. Following the merger, the new club spent the ensuing 15 years playing the "District de l'Escaut" Championship. In July 1930, the National Council of the French Football Federation voted 128–20 in support of professionalism in French football. Valenciennes, under the leadership of president M. Le Mithouard, achieved professionalism in 1933 and were inserted into the second division. The club, subsequently, became a founding member of the second division of French football.In the second division's inaugural season, Valenciennes finished in 7th place in its group. In the following season, the league table was converted into a single table and Valenciennes finished in 2nd-place position earning promotion to Division 1 as a result. During this period, the club was notably led by foreign players such as Englishmen Peter O'Dowd and George Gibson and the German-born attackers Édouard Waggi and Ignace Kowalczyk. In the club's first season in Division 1, Valenciennes finished 15th place falling back to Division 2. The club finished equal on points with Red Star Olympique, but due to having less wins and a lesser goal difference, Valenciennes were relegated. After suffering relegation, the club brought in a new president known by the surname of Turbot. Soon after arriving, Turbot released several of the club's international players and brought in the likes of Ernest Libérati to replace them. The transition was a success with the club earning promotion back to Division 1 in 1937. However, Valenciennes stint back in Division 1 was the equivalent of its first. The club finished in last place in the 1937–38 season and relegated back to Division 2. Due to World War II, Valenciennes reverted to amateur status and spent three of the six seasons in wartime playing amateur league football.After the war, Valenciennes turned professional again and were back in the second division. The club spent a decade in Division 2 before earning promotion the top-flight ahead of the 1956–57 season. Under manager Charles Demeillez, in 1951, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe de France. In the final, the club faced Strasbourg and were humbled 3–0 at the Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir in the Colombes. In the club's return to Division 1, Valenciennes finished in the latter part of the table for three consecutive seasons. In 1959, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe Drago, but were defeated 3–2 in extra time by Lens at the Parc des Princes. In the 1959–60 season, Valenciennes achieved its best finish in Division 1 after finishing 8th in the table. However, manager Robert Domergue was unable to keep the consistency as Valenciennes finished 19th in the following season. Valenciennes, now being led by youngsters Bolec Kocik and Serge Masnaghetti, achieved promotion back to Division 1 after one season and spent the next nine years playing in Division 1. During the stint, Domergue led to club to its highest finish ever in the first division when the club finished 3rd in back-to-back seasons in 1965 and 1966. After the 1966 season, Domergue departed the club and he was replaced by Gaby Robert. Neither Robert or his successor Louis Provelli could match the consistency of Domergue and he returned to the club in 1970. In the club's first season back, Domergue led the club to relegation in 1971, got the club promoted back to the first division in 1972, and coached the club to relegation again in 1973. He departed after the season and was replaced by Jean-Pierre Destrumelle.After spending the early 1970s hovering between top flight and the second division, Destrumelle led the club back to Division 1 for the 1975–76 season. The manager had vast majority of talent in the club, most notably Bruno Metsu, Bruno Zaremba, Dominique Dropsy, and Didier Six and kept the club in the first division for his entire campaign, however, after finishing in 18th place in 1979, Dustremelle was fired and replaced by the combination of Erwin Wilczek and Bolek Tomowski. Under the duo, Valenciennes lasted in Division 1 until the 1983 season. The club, subsequently, spent the next decade playing in Division 2 under five different managers, which led supporters to slowly become disassociated with the club.From 1988 to 1991, Valenciennes improved significantly under manager Georges Peyroche. Peyroche left the club in 1991 and Francis Smerecki was named as his replacement. In Smerecki's first season, he led the club back to Division 1. In the club's first season back, Valenciennes were involved in a bribing scandal that effectively dismantled the club for the next decade. The scandal, which involved Marseille midfielder Jean-Jacques Eydelie and the club's general manager under the advisement of club chairman Bernard Tapie bribing Valenciennes players Christophe Robert, Jacques Glassmann, and Jorge Burruchaga, became headline news mainly due to Marseille being the most popular club in the country. It was asserted that the bribe was made in order for Valenciennes players to "take it easy" on Marseille players with the latter club having to play in the 1993 UEFA Champions League Final against Italian club Milan just days later. Marseille beat Valenciennes 1–0 and went on to defeat Milan to become the first French club to win the European competition. After the plot was discovered, Robert admitted to accepting the bribe, Burruchaga admitted to initially agreeing to it, but later changing his mind, while Glassmann said he never agreed to the deal. The subsequent reports of the scandal completely tarnished the Valenciennes's image and several players departed the club amid embarrassment and speculation that they were also involved in the plot. With the club now playing in Ligue 2, Valenciennes was unable to cope with the damage instilled on it due to the scandal and finished dead last in the league, thus falling to the third division for the first time in the club's lifetime. Two seasons later, the club was relegated to the fourth division due to financial problems. Ahead of the 1996–97 season, the club dropped to amateur status after filing for bankruptcy.On 1 April 1996, the club was renamed Valenciennes Football Club and finished in fifth place in its inaugural campaign under the name. In the following season, the fourth division was renamed to the Championnat de France amateur and Valenciennes became inaugural champions of the league. Over the next seven seasons, Valenciennes played in the Championnat National, excluding one season back in the CFA. In the 2004–05 season, the club won National and returned to the second division, now called Ligue 2. Surprisingly, after one season, Valenciennes earned promotion back to the first division, now called Ligue 1, under the leadership of Antoine Kombouaré. After eight years in Ligue 1, the club was relegated to the second division in 2014. Because of this relegation, VAFC experienced financial problems and saw the return to the business of the former minister Jean-Louis Borloo. He saved the club from demotion to the fourth division.Below are the notable former players who have represented Valenciennes in league and international competition since the club's foundation in 1913."For a complete list of Valenciennes players, see ".
|
[
"Christophe Delmotte",
"Nicolas Rabuel"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team Valenciennes F.C. in 03-Sep-202103-September-2021?
|
September 03, 2021
|
{
"text": [
"Olivier Guégan"
]
}
|
L2_Q212269_P286_0
|
Olivier Guégan is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2019 to Nov, 2021.
Christophe Delmotte is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Nov, 2021 to Jun, 2022.
Nicolas Rabuel is the head coach of Valenciennes F.C. from Jun, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
|
Valenciennes FCValenciennes Football Club (; commonly known as Valenciennes or USVA) is a French association football club based in Valenciennes. The club was founded in 1913 and currently play in Ligue 2, the second tier of French football. Valenciennes plays its home matches at the recently built Stade du Hainaut located within the city.Valenciennes was founded under the name Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA). The club spent over 80 years playing under the name before switching to its current name. Valenciennes has spent an equal amount of time playing in Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 having played 40 seasons in the first division and 36 seasons in the second division. The club has never won the first division, but has won Ligue 2 on two occasions. Valenciennes has also won the Championnat National and the Championnat de France amateur in 2005 and 1998, respectively. In 1951, the club made its first and only appearance in a Coupe de France final.From 2004 to 2011, Valenciennes was presided over by Francis Decourrière, a former politician who served as a Member of the European Parliament under the Social Democratic Party from 1994 to 1999 and later the "Union pour la Démocratie Française" ("Union for French Democracy") from 1999 to 2004. In 2011, Decourrière left the position and was replaced by Jean-Raymond Legrand.Valenciennes Football Club was founded in 1913 by a group of young men known by surnames Colson, Joly, and Bouly. Due to the club having limited resources and its formation coinciding with the onset of World War I, Valenciennes sought a consolidation between locals clubs in the city. The merger was completed in 1916 with the club changing its name to Union Sportive de Valenciennes Anzin (USVA) in the process. Following the merger, the new club spent the ensuing 15 years playing the "District de l'Escaut" Championship. In July 1930, the National Council of the French Football Federation voted 128–20 in support of professionalism in French football. Valenciennes, under the leadership of president M. Le Mithouard, achieved professionalism in 1933 and were inserted into the second division. The club, subsequently, became a founding member of the second division of French football.In the second division's inaugural season, Valenciennes finished in 7th place in its group. In the following season, the league table was converted into a single table and Valenciennes finished in 2nd-place position earning promotion to Division 1 as a result. During this period, the club was notably led by foreign players such as Englishmen Peter O'Dowd and George Gibson and the German-born attackers Édouard Waggi and Ignace Kowalczyk. In the club's first season in Division 1, Valenciennes finished 15th place falling back to Division 2. The club finished equal on points with Red Star Olympique, but due to having less wins and a lesser goal difference, Valenciennes were relegated. After suffering relegation, the club brought in a new president known by the surname of Turbot. Soon after arriving, Turbot released several of the club's international players and brought in the likes of Ernest Libérati to replace them. The transition was a success with the club earning promotion back to Division 1 in 1937. However, Valenciennes stint back in Division 1 was the equivalent of its first. The club finished in last place in the 1937–38 season and relegated back to Division 2. Due to World War II, Valenciennes reverted to amateur status and spent three of the six seasons in wartime playing amateur league football.After the war, Valenciennes turned professional again and were back in the second division. The club spent a decade in Division 2 before earning promotion the top-flight ahead of the 1956–57 season. Under manager Charles Demeillez, in 1951, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe de France. In the final, the club faced Strasbourg and were humbled 3–0 at the Stade Olympique Yves-du-Manoir in the Colombes. In the club's return to Division 1, Valenciennes finished in the latter part of the table for three consecutive seasons. In 1959, Valenciennes reached the final of the Coupe Drago, but were defeated 3–2 in extra time by Lens at the Parc des Princes. In the 1959–60 season, Valenciennes achieved its best finish in Division 1 after finishing 8th in the table. However, manager Robert Domergue was unable to keep the consistency as Valenciennes finished 19th in the following season. Valenciennes, now being led by youngsters Bolec Kocik and Serge Masnaghetti, achieved promotion back to Division 1 after one season and spent the next nine years playing in Division 1. During the stint, Domergue led to club to its highest finish ever in the first division when the club finished 3rd in back-to-back seasons in 1965 and 1966. After the 1966 season, Domergue departed the club and he was replaced by Gaby Robert. Neither Robert or his successor Louis Provelli could match the consistency of Domergue and he returned to the club in 1970. In the club's first season back, Domergue led the club to relegation in 1971, got the club promoted back to the first division in 1972, and coached the club to relegation again in 1973. He departed after the season and was replaced by Jean-Pierre Destrumelle.After spending the early 1970s hovering between top flight and the second division, Destrumelle led the club back to Division 1 for the 1975–76 season. The manager had vast majority of talent in the club, most notably Bruno Metsu, Bruno Zaremba, Dominique Dropsy, and Didier Six and kept the club in the first division for his entire campaign, however, after finishing in 18th place in 1979, Dustremelle was fired and replaced by the combination of Erwin Wilczek and Bolek Tomowski. Under the duo, Valenciennes lasted in Division 1 until the 1983 season. The club, subsequently, spent the next decade playing in Division 2 under five different managers, which led supporters to slowly become disassociated with the club.From 1988 to 1991, Valenciennes improved significantly under manager Georges Peyroche. Peyroche left the club in 1991 and Francis Smerecki was named as his replacement. In Smerecki's first season, he led the club back to Division 1. In the club's first season back, Valenciennes were involved in a bribing scandal that effectively dismantled the club for the next decade. The scandal, which involved Marseille midfielder Jean-Jacques Eydelie and the club's general manager under the advisement of club chairman Bernard Tapie bribing Valenciennes players Christophe Robert, Jacques Glassmann, and Jorge Burruchaga, became headline news mainly due to Marseille being the most popular club in the country. It was asserted that the bribe was made in order for Valenciennes players to "take it easy" on Marseille players with the latter club having to play in the 1993 UEFA Champions League Final against Italian club Milan just days later. Marseille beat Valenciennes 1–0 and went on to defeat Milan to become the first French club to win the European competition. After the plot was discovered, Robert admitted to accepting the bribe, Burruchaga admitted to initially agreeing to it, but later changing his mind, while Glassmann said he never agreed to the deal. The subsequent reports of the scandal completely tarnished the Valenciennes's image and several players departed the club amid embarrassment and speculation that they were also involved in the plot. With the club now playing in Ligue 2, Valenciennes was unable to cope with the damage instilled on it due to the scandal and finished dead last in the league, thus falling to the third division for the first time in the club's lifetime. Two seasons later, the club was relegated to the fourth division due to financial problems. Ahead of the 1996–97 season, the club dropped to amateur status after filing for bankruptcy.On 1 April 1996, the club was renamed Valenciennes Football Club and finished in fifth place in its inaugural campaign under the name. In the following season, the fourth division was renamed to the Championnat de France amateur and Valenciennes became inaugural champions of the league. Over the next seven seasons, Valenciennes played in the Championnat National, excluding one season back in the CFA. In the 2004–05 season, the club won National and returned to the second division, now called Ligue 2. Surprisingly, after one season, Valenciennes earned promotion back to the first division, now called Ligue 1, under the leadership of Antoine Kombouaré. After eight years in Ligue 1, the club was relegated to the second division in 2014. Because of this relegation, VAFC experienced financial problems and saw the return to the business of the former minister Jean-Louis Borloo. He saved the club from demotion to the fourth division.Below are the notable former players who have represented Valenciennes in league and international competition since the club's foundation in 1913."For a complete list of Valenciennes players, see ".
|
[
"Christophe Delmotte",
"Nicolas Rabuel"
] |
|
Who was the chair of United States Cyber Command in Apr, 2014?
|
April 01, 2014
|
{
"text": [
"Jon M. Davis",
"Michael S. Rogers"
]
}
|
L2_Q1783579_P488_1
|
Michael S. Rogers is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Apr, 2014 to Dec, 2022.
Jon M. Davis is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Mar, 2014 to Apr, 2014.
Keith B. Alexander is the chair of United States Cyber Command from May, 2010 to Mar, 2014.
|
United States Cyber CommandUnited States Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) is one of the eleven unified combatant commands of the United States Department of Defense (DoD). It unifies the direction of cyberspace operations, strengthens DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrates and bolsters DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM was created in mid-2009 at the National Security Agency (NSA) headquarters in Fort George G. Meade, Maryland. It cooperates with NSA networks and has been concurrently headed by the director of the National Security Agency since its inception. While originally created with a defensive mission in mind, it has increasingly been viewed as an offensive force. On 18 August 2017, it was announced that USCYBERCOM would be elevated to the status of a full and independent unified combatant command. This elevation occurred on 4 May 2018.According to the US Department of Defense (DoD):The text "9ec4c12949a4f31474f299058ce2b22a", located in the command's emblem, is the MD5 hash of their mission statement.The command is charged with pulling together existing cyberspace resources, creating synergies and synchronizing war-fighting effects to defend the information security environment. USCYBERCOM is tasked with centralizing command of cyberspace operations, strengthening DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrating and bolstering DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM is an armed forces unified command under Department of Defense (DoD).U.S. Cyber Command is composed of several service components, units from military services who will provide Joint services to Cyber Command.In 2015, the U.S. Cyber Command added 133 new cyber teams. The breakdown was: An intention by the U.S. Air Force to create a 'cyber command' was announced in October 2006. An Air Force Cyber Command was created in a provisional status in November 2006. However, in October 2008, it was announced the command would not be brought into permanent activation.On 23 June 2009, the Secretary of Defense directed the Commander of U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM) to establish USCYBERCOM. In May 2010, General Keith Alexander outlined his views in a report for the United States House Committee on Armed Services subcommittee:Initial operational capability was attained on 21 May 2010. General Alexander was promoted to four-star rank, becoming one of 38 U.S. generals, and took charge of U.S. Cyber Command in a ceremony at Fort Meade that was attended by Commander of U.S. Central Command GEN David Petraeus, and Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates.USCYBERCOM reached full operational capability on 31 October 2010.The command assumed responsibility for several existing organizations. The Joint Task Force for Global Network Operations (JTF-GNO) and the Joint Functional Component Command for Network Warfare (JFCC-NW) were absorbed by the command. The Defense Information Systems Agency, where JTF-GNO operated, provides technical assistance for network and information assurance to USCYBERCOM, and is moving its headquarters to Fort Meade.President Obama signed into law, on 23 December 2016, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year (FY) 2017, which elevated USCYBERCOM to a unified combatant command. The FY 2017 NDAA also specified that the dual-hatted arrangement of the commander of USCYBERCOM will not be terminated until the Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff jointly certify that ending this arrangement will not pose risks to the military effectiveness of CYBERCOM that are unacceptable to the national security interests of the United States.There are concerns that the Pentagon and NSA will overshadow any civilian cyber defense efforts. There are also concerns on whether the command will assist in civilian cyber defense efforts. According to Deputy Secretary of Defense William J. Lynn, the command "will lead day-to-day defense and protection of all DoD networks. It will be responsible for DoD's networks – the dot-mil world. Responsibility for federal civilian networks – dot-gov – stays with the Department of Homeland Security, and that's exactly how it should be." Alexander notes, however, that if faced with cyber hostilities an executive order could expand Cyber Command's spectrum of operations to include, for instance, assisting the Department of Homeland Security in defense of their networks.Some military leaders claim that the existing cultures of the Army, Navy, and Air Force are fundamentally incompatible with that of cyber warfare. Major Robert Costa (USAF) even suggested a sixth branch of the military, an Information (Cyber) Service with Title 10 responsibilities analogous to its sister services in 2002 noting: Others have also discussed the creation of a cyber-warfare branch. Lieutenant Colonel Gregory Conti and Colonel John "Buck" Surdu (chief of staff of the United States Army Research, Development and Engineering Command) stated that the three major services are "properly positioned to fight kinetic wars, and they value skills such as marksmanship, physical strength, the ability to leap out of airplanes and lead combat units under enemy fire."Conti and Surdu reasoned, "Adding an efficient and effective cyber branch alongside the Army, Navy and Air Force would provide our nation with the capability to defend our technological infrastructure and conduct offensive operations. Perhaps more important, the existence of this capability would serve as a strong deterrent for our nation's enemies."In response to concerns about the military's right to respond to cyber attacks, General Alexander stated "The U.S. must fire back against cyber attacks swiftly and strongly and should act to counter or disable a threat even when the identity of the attacker is unknown" prior to his confirmation hearings before the United States Congress. This came in response to incidents such as a 2008 operation to take down a government-run extremist honeypot in Saudi Arabia. "Elite U.S. military computer specialists, over the objections of the CIA, mounted a cyberattack that dismantled the online forum"."The new U.S. Cyber Command needs to strike a balance between protecting military assets and personal privacy." stated Alexander, in a Defense Department release. If confirmed, Alexander said, his main focus will be on building capacity and capability to secure the networks and educating the public on the command's intent."This command is not about an effort to militarize cyber space," he said. "Rather, it's about safeguarding our military assets."In July 2011, Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn announced in a conference that "We have, within Cyber Command, a full spectrum of capabilities, but the thrust of the strategy is defensive." "The strategy rests on five pillars, he said: treat cyber as a domain; employ more active defenses; support the Department of Homeland Security in protecting critical infrastructure networks; practice collective defense with allies and international partners; and reduce the advantages attackers have on the Internet."In 2013, USCYBERCOM held a classified exercise in which reserve officers (with extensive experience in their civilian cyber-security work) easily defeated active duty cyber warriors. In 2015 Eric Rosenbach, the principal cyber adviser to Defense Secretary Ash Carter, said DoD was looking at alternatives to staffing with just active-duty military. Beginning that year, USCYBERCOM added 133 teams (staffing out at 6,000 people), with the intent that at least 15% of the personnel would be reserve cyber operations airmen. These new teams had achieved "initial operating capability" (IOC) as of 21 October 2016. Officials noted that IOC is not the same as combat readiness, but is the first step in that direction.President Barack Obama's Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity was formed to develop a plan for protecting cyberspace. The commission released a report in December 2016. The report made 16 major recommendations regarding the intertwining roles of the military, government administration and the private sector in providing cyber security.President Trump indicated that he wanted a full review of Cyber Command during his bid for presidency. During his presidency, the Trump administration made Cyber Command a unified combatant command, and took other measures attempting to deter cyber attacks. However, the FBI reported that they logged a record number of complaints and economic losses in 2019, as cybercrime continued to grow.The creation of U.S. Cyber Command appears to have motivated other countries in this arena. In December 2009, South Korea announced the creation of a cyber warfare command. Reportedly, this was in response to North Korea's creation of a cyber warfare unit. In addition, the British GCHQ has begun preparing a cyber force. Furthermore, a shift in military interest in cyber warfare has motivated the creation of the first U.S. Cyber Warfare Intelligence Center. In 2010, China introduced a department dedicated to defensive cyber war and information security in response to the creation of USCYBERCOM.In June 2019, Russia has conceded that it is "possible" its electrical grid was under cyberattack by the United States. The "New York Times" reported that hackers from the U.S. Cyber Command planted malware potentially capable of disrupting the Russian electrical grid.Cyber command is using its 2021 exercise Cyber Flag 21-2 to improve its teams' tactics.
|
[
"Keith B. Alexander",
"Michael S. Rogers",
"Keith B. Alexander"
] |
|
Who was the chair of United States Cyber Command in 2014-04-01?
|
April 01, 2014
|
{
"text": [
"Jon M. Davis",
"Michael S. Rogers"
]
}
|
L2_Q1783579_P488_1
|
Michael S. Rogers is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Apr, 2014 to Dec, 2022.
Jon M. Davis is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Mar, 2014 to Apr, 2014.
Keith B. Alexander is the chair of United States Cyber Command from May, 2010 to Mar, 2014.
|
United States Cyber CommandUnited States Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) is one of the eleven unified combatant commands of the United States Department of Defense (DoD). It unifies the direction of cyberspace operations, strengthens DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrates and bolsters DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM was created in mid-2009 at the National Security Agency (NSA) headquarters in Fort George G. Meade, Maryland. It cooperates with NSA networks and has been concurrently headed by the director of the National Security Agency since its inception. While originally created with a defensive mission in mind, it has increasingly been viewed as an offensive force. On 18 August 2017, it was announced that USCYBERCOM would be elevated to the status of a full and independent unified combatant command. This elevation occurred on 4 May 2018.According to the US Department of Defense (DoD):The text "9ec4c12949a4f31474f299058ce2b22a", located in the command's emblem, is the MD5 hash of their mission statement.The command is charged with pulling together existing cyberspace resources, creating synergies and synchronizing war-fighting effects to defend the information security environment. USCYBERCOM is tasked with centralizing command of cyberspace operations, strengthening DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrating and bolstering DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM is an armed forces unified command under Department of Defense (DoD).U.S. Cyber Command is composed of several service components, units from military services who will provide Joint services to Cyber Command.In 2015, the U.S. Cyber Command added 133 new cyber teams. The breakdown was: An intention by the U.S. Air Force to create a 'cyber command' was announced in October 2006. An Air Force Cyber Command was created in a provisional status in November 2006. However, in October 2008, it was announced the command would not be brought into permanent activation.On 23 June 2009, the Secretary of Defense directed the Commander of U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM) to establish USCYBERCOM. In May 2010, General Keith Alexander outlined his views in a report for the United States House Committee on Armed Services subcommittee:Initial operational capability was attained on 21 May 2010. General Alexander was promoted to four-star rank, becoming one of 38 U.S. generals, and took charge of U.S. Cyber Command in a ceremony at Fort Meade that was attended by Commander of U.S. Central Command GEN David Petraeus, and Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates.USCYBERCOM reached full operational capability on 31 October 2010.The command assumed responsibility for several existing organizations. The Joint Task Force for Global Network Operations (JTF-GNO) and the Joint Functional Component Command for Network Warfare (JFCC-NW) were absorbed by the command. The Defense Information Systems Agency, where JTF-GNO operated, provides technical assistance for network and information assurance to USCYBERCOM, and is moving its headquarters to Fort Meade.President Obama signed into law, on 23 December 2016, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year (FY) 2017, which elevated USCYBERCOM to a unified combatant command. The FY 2017 NDAA also specified that the dual-hatted arrangement of the commander of USCYBERCOM will not be terminated until the Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff jointly certify that ending this arrangement will not pose risks to the military effectiveness of CYBERCOM that are unacceptable to the national security interests of the United States.There are concerns that the Pentagon and NSA will overshadow any civilian cyber defense efforts. There are also concerns on whether the command will assist in civilian cyber defense efforts. According to Deputy Secretary of Defense William J. Lynn, the command "will lead day-to-day defense and protection of all DoD networks. It will be responsible for DoD's networks – the dot-mil world. Responsibility for federal civilian networks – dot-gov – stays with the Department of Homeland Security, and that's exactly how it should be." Alexander notes, however, that if faced with cyber hostilities an executive order could expand Cyber Command's spectrum of operations to include, for instance, assisting the Department of Homeland Security in defense of their networks.Some military leaders claim that the existing cultures of the Army, Navy, and Air Force are fundamentally incompatible with that of cyber warfare. Major Robert Costa (USAF) even suggested a sixth branch of the military, an Information (Cyber) Service with Title 10 responsibilities analogous to its sister services in 2002 noting: Others have also discussed the creation of a cyber-warfare branch. Lieutenant Colonel Gregory Conti and Colonel John "Buck" Surdu (chief of staff of the United States Army Research, Development and Engineering Command) stated that the three major services are "properly positioned to fight kinetic wars, and they value skills such as marksmanship, physical strength, the ability to leap out of airplanes and lead combat units under enemy fire."Conti and Surdu reasoned, "Adding an efficient and effective cyber branch alongside the Army, Navy and Air Force would provide our nation with the capability to defend our technological infrastructure and conduct offensive operations. Perhaps more important, the existence of this capability would serve as a strong deterrent for our nation's enemies."In response to concerns about the military's right to respond to cyber attacks, General Alexander stated "The U.S. must fire back against cyber attacks swiftly and strongly and should act to counter or disable a threat even when the identity of the attacker is unknown" prior to his confirmation hearings before the United States Congress. This came in response to incidents such as a 2008 operation to take down a government-run extremist honeypot in Saudi Arabia. "Elite U.S. military computer specialists, over the objections of the CIA, mounted a cyberattack that dismantled the online forum"."The new U.S. Cyber Command needs to strike a balance between protecting military assets and personal privacy." stated Alexander, in a Defense Department release. If confirmed, Alexander said, his main focus will be on building capacity and capability to secure the networks and educating the public on the command's intent."This command is not about an effort to militarize cyber space," he said. "Rather, it's about safeguarding our military assets."In July 2011, Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn announced in a conference that "We have, within Cyber Command, a full spectrum of capabilities, but the thrust of the strategy is defensive." "The strategy rests on five pillars, he said: treat cyber as a domain; employ more active defenses; support the Department of Homeland Security in protecting critical infrastructure networks; practice collective defense with allies and international partners; and reduce the advantages attackers have on the Internet."In 2013, USCYBERCOM held a classified exercise in which reserve officers (with extensive experience in their civilian cyber-security work) easily defeated active duty cyber warriors. In 2015 Eric Rosenbach, the principal cyber adviser to Defense Secretary Ash Carter, said DoD was looking at alternatives to staffing with just active-duty military. Beginning that year, USCYBERCOM added 133 teams (staffing out at 6,000 people), with the intent that at least 15% of the personnel would be reserve cyber operations airmen. These new teams had achieved "initial operating capability" (IOC) as of 21 October 2016. Officials noted that IOC is not the same as combat readiness, but is the first step in that direction.President Barack Obama's Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity was formed to develop a plan for protecting cyberspace. The commission released a report in December 2016. The report made 16 major recommendations regarding the intertwining roles of the military, government administration and the private sector in providing cyber security.President Trump indicated that he wanted a full review of Cyber Command during his bid for presidency. During his presidency, the Trump administration made Cyber Command a unified combatant command, and took other measures attempting to deter cyber attacks. However, the FBI reported that they logged a record number of complaints and economic losses in 2019, as cybercrime continued to grow.The creation of U.S. Cyber Command appears to have motivated other countries in this arena. In December 2009, South Korea announced the creation of a cyber warfare command. Reportedly, this was in response to North Korea's creation of a cyber warfare unit. In addition, the British GCHQ has begun preparing a cyber force. Furthermore, a shift in military interest in cyber warfare has motivated the creation of the first U.S. Cyber Warfare Intelligence Center. In 2010, China introduced a department dedicated to defensive cyber war and information security in response to the creation of USCYBERCOM.In June 2019, Russia has conceded that it is "possible" its electrical grid was under cyberattack by the United States. The "New York Times" reported that hackers from the U.S. Cyber Command planted malware potentially capable of disrupting the Russian electrical grid.Cyber command is using its 2021 exercise Cyber Flag 21-2 to improve its teams' tactics.
|
[
"Keith B. Alexander",
"Michael S. Rogers",
"Keith B. Alexander"
] |
|
Who was the chair of United States Cyber Command in 01/04/2014?
|
April 01, 2014
|
{
"text": [
"Jon M. Davis",
"Michael S. Rogers"
]
}
|
L2_Q1783579_P488_1
|
Michael S. Rogers is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Apr, 2014 to Dec, 2022.
Jon M. Davis is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Mar, 2014 to Apr, 2014.
Keith B. Alexander is the chair of United States Cyber Command from May, 2010 to Mar, 2014.
|
United States Cyber CommandUnited States Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) is one of the eleven unified combatant commands of the United States Department of Defense (DoD). It unifies the direction of cyberspace operations, strengthens DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrates and bolsters DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM was created in mid-2009 at the National Security Agency (NSA) headquarters in Fort George G. Meade, Maryland. It cooperates with NSA networks and has been concurrently headed by the director of the National Security Agency since its inception. While originally created with a defensive mission in mind, it has increasingly been viewed as an offensive force. On 18 August 2017, it was announced that USCYBERCOM would be elevated to the status of a full and independent unified combatant command. This elevation occurred on 4 May 2018.According to the US Department of Defense (DoD):The text "9ec4c12949a4f31474f299058ce2b22a", located in the command's emblem, is the MD5 hash of their mission statement.The command is charged with pulling together existing cyberspace resources, creating synergies and synchronizing war-fighting effects to defend the information security environment. USCYBERCOM is tasked with centralizing command of cyberspace operations, strengthening DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrating and bolstering DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM is an armed forces unified command under Department of Defense (DoD).U.S. Cyber Command is composed of several service components, units from military services who will provide Joint services to Cyber Command.In 2015, the U.S. Cyber Command added 133 new cyber teams. The breakdown was: An intention by the U.S. Air Force to create a 'cyber command' was announced in October 2006. An Air Force Cyber Command was created in a provisional status in November 2006. However, in October 2008, it was announced the command would not be brought into permanent activation.On 23 June 2009, the Secretary of Defense directed the Commander of U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM) to establish USCYBERCOM. In May 2010, General Keith Alexander outlined his views in a report for the United States House Committee on Armed Services subcommittee:Initial operational capability was attained on 21 May 2010. General Alexander was promoted to four-star rank, becoming one of 38 U.S. generals, and took charge of U.S. Cyber Command in a ceremony at Fort Meade that was attended by Commander of U.S. Central Command GEN David Petraeus, and Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates.USCYBERCOM reached full operational capability on 31 October 2010.The command assumed responsibility for several existing organizations. The Joint Task Force for Global Network Operations (JTF-GNO) and the Joint Functional Component Command for Network Warfare (JFCC-NW) were absorbed by the command. The Defense Information Systems Agency, where JTF-GNO operated, provides technical assistance for network and information assurance to USCYBERCOM, and is moving its headquarters to Fort Meade.President Obama signed into law, on 23 December 2016, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year (FY) 2017, which elevated USCYBERCOM to a unified combatant command. The FY 2017 NDAA also specified that the dual-hatted arrangement of the commander of USCYBERCOM will not be terminated until the Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff jointly certify that ending this arrangement will not pose risks to the military effectiveness of CYBERCOM that are unacceptable to the national security interests of the United States.There are concerns that the Pentagon and NSA will overshadow any civilian cyber defense efforts. There are also concerns on whether the command will assist in civilian cyber defense efforts. According to Deputy Secretary of Defense William J. Lynn, the command "will lead day-to-day defense and protection of all DoD networks. It will be responsible for DoD's networks – the dot-mil world. Responsibility for federal civilian networks – dot-gov – stays with the Department of Homeland Security, and that's exactly how it should be." Alexander notes, however, that if faced with cyber hostilities an executive order could expand Cyber Command's spectrum of operations to include, for instance, assisting the Department of Homeland Security in defense of their networks.Some military leaders claim that the existing cultures of the Army, Navy, and Air Force are fundamentally incompatible with that of cyber warfare. Major Robert Costa (USAF) even suggested a sixth branch of the military, an Information (Cyber) Service with Title 10 responsibilities analogous to its sister services in 2002 noting: Others have also discussed the creation of a cyber-warfare branch. Lieutenant Colonel Gregory Conti and Colonel John "Buck" Surdu (chief of staff of the United States Army Research, Development and Engineering Command) stated that the three major services are "properly positioned to fight kinetic wars, and they value skills such as marksmanship, physical strength, the ability to leap out of airplanes and lead combat units under enemy fire."Conti and Surdu reasoned, "Adding an efficient and effective cyber branch alongside the Army, Navy and Air Force would provide our nation with the capability to defend our technological infrastructure and conduct offensive operations. Perhaps more important, the existence of this capability would serve as a strong deterrent for our nation's enemies."In response to concerns about the military's right to respond to cyber attacks, General Alexander stated "The U.S. must fire back against cyber attacks swiftly and strongly and should act to counter or disable a threat even when the identity of the attacker is unknown" prior to his confirmation hearings before the United States Congress. This came in response to incidents such as a 2008 operation to take down a government-run extremist honeypot in Saudi Arabia. "Elite U.S. military computer specialists, over the objections of the CIA, mounted a cyberattack that dismantled the online forum"."The new U.S. Cyber Command needs to strike a balance between protecting military assets and personal privacy." stated Alexander, in a Defense Department release. If confirmed, Alexander said, his main focus will be on building capacity and capability to secure the networks and educating the public on the command's intent."This command is not about an effort to militarize cyber space," he said. "Rather, it's about safeguarding our military assets."In July 2011, Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn announced in a conference that "We have, within Cyber Command, a full spectrum of capabilities, but the thrust of the strategy is defensive." "The strategy rests on five pillars, he said: treat cyber as a domain; employ more active defenses; support the Department of Homeland Security in protecting critical infrastructure networks; practice collective defense with allies and international partners; and reduce the advantages attackers have on the Internet."In 2013, USCYBERCOM held a classified exercise in which reserve officers (with extensive experience in their civilian cyber-security work) easily defeated active duty cyber warriors. In 2015 Eric Rosenbach, the principal cyber adviser to Defense Secretary Ash Carter, said DoD was looking at alternatives to staffing with just active-duty military. Beginning that year, USCYBERCOM added 133 teams (staffing out at 6,000 people), with the intent that at least 15% of the personnel would be reserve cyber operations airmen. These new teams had achieved "initial operating capability" (IOC) as of 21 October 2016. Officials noted that IOC is not the same as combat readiness, but is the first step in that direction.President Barack Obama's Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity was formed to develop a plan for protecting cyberspace. The commission released a report in December 2016. The report made 16 major recommendations regarding the intertwining roles of the military, government administration and the private sector in providing cyber security.President Trump indicated that he wanted a full review of Cyber Command during his bid for presidency. During his presidency, the Trump administration made Cyber Command a unified combatant command, and took other measures attempting to deter cyber attacks. However, the FBI reported that they logged a record number of complaints and economic losses in 2019, as cybercrime continued to grow.The creation of U.S. Cyber Command appears to have motivated other countries in this arena. In December 2009, South Korea announced the creation of a cyber warfare command. Reportedly, this was in response to North Korea's creation of a cyber warfare unit. In addition, the British GCHQ has begun preparing a cyber force. Furthermore, a shift in military interest in cyber warfare has motivated the creation of the first U.S. Cyber Warfare Intelligence Center. In 2010, China introduced a department dedicated to defensive cyber war and information security in response to the creation of USCYBERCOM.In June 2019, Russia has conceded that it is "possible" its electrical grid was under cyberattack by the United States. The "New York Times" reported that hackers from the U.S. Cyber Command planted malware potentially capable of disrupting the Russian electrical grid.Cyber command is using its 2021 exercise Cyber Flag 21-2 to improve its teams' tactics.
|
[
"Keith B. Alexander",
"Michael S. Rogers",
"Keith B. Alexander"
] |
|
Who was the chair of United States Cyber Command in Apr 01, 2014?
|
April 01, 2014
|
{
"text": [
"Jon M. Davis",
"Michael S. Rogers"
]
}
|
L2_Q1783579_P488_1
|
Michael S. Rogers is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Apr, 2014 to Dec, 2022.
Jon M. Davis is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Mar, 2014 to Apr, 2014.
Keith B. Alexander is the chair of United States Cyber Command from May, 2010 to Mar, 2014.
|
United States Cyber CommandUnited States Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) is one of the eleven unified combatant commands of the United States Department of Defense (DoD). It unifies the direction of cyberspace operations, strengthens DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrates and bolsters DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM was created in mid-2009 at the National Security Agency (NSA) headquarters in Fort George G. Meade, Maryland. It cooperates with NSA networks and has been concurrently headed by the director of the National Security Agency since its inception. While originally created with a defensive mission in mind, it has increasingly been viewed as an offensive force. On 18 August 2017, it was announced that USCYBERCOM would be elevated to the status of a full and independent unified combatant command. This elevation occurred on 4 May 2018.According to the US Department of Defense (DoD):The text "9ec4c12949a4f31474f299058ce2b22a", located in the command's emblem, is the MD5 hash of their mission statement.The command is charged with pulling together existing cyberspace resources, creating synergies and synchronizing war-fighting effects to defend the information security environment. USCYBERCOM is tasked with centralizing command of cyberspace operations, strengthening DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrating and bolstering DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM is an armed forces unified command under Department of Defense (DoD).U.S. Cyber Command is composed of several service components, units from military services who will provide Joint services to Cyber Command.In 2015, the U.S. Cyber Command added 133 new cyber teams. The breakdown was: An intention by the U.S. Air Force to create a 'cyber command' was announced in October 2006. An Air Force Cyber Command was created in a provisional status in November 2006. However, in October 2008, it was announced the command would not be brought into permanent activation.On 23 June 2009, the Secretary of Defense directed the Commander of U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM) to establish USCYBERCOM. In May 2010, General Keith Alexander outlined his views in a report for the United States House Committee on Armed Services subcommittee:Initial operational capability was attained on 21 May 2010. General Alexander was promoted to four-star rank, becoming one of 38 U.S. generals, and took charge of U.S. Cyber Command in a ceremony at Fort Meade that was attended by Commander of U.S. Central Command GEN David Petraeus, and Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates.USCYBERCOM reached full operational capability on 31 October 2010.The command assumed responsibility for several existing organizations. The Joint Task Force for Global Network Operations (JTF-GNO) and the Joint Functional Component Command for Network Warfare (JFCC-NW) were absorbed by the command. The Defense Information Systems Agency, where JTF-GNO operated, provides technical assistance for network and information assurance to USCYBERCOM, and is moving its headquarters to Fort Meade.President Obama signed into law, on 23 December 2016, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year (FY) 2017, which elevated USCYBERCOM to a unified combatant command. The FY 2017 NDAA also specified that the dual-hatted arrangement of the commander of USCYBERCOM will not be terminated until the Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff jointly certify that ending this arrangement will not pose risks to the military effectiveness of CYBERCOM that are unacceptable to the national security interests of the United States.There are concerns that the Pentagon and NSA will overshadow any civilian cyber defense efforts. There are also concerns on whether the command will assist in civilian cyber defense efforts. According to Deputy Secretary of Defense William J. Lynn, the command "will lead day-to-day defense and protection of all DoD networks. It will be responsible for DoD's networks – the dot-mil world. Responsibility for federal civilian networks – dot-gov – stays with the Department of Homeland Security, and that's exactly how it should be." Alexander notes, however, that if faced with cyber hostilities an executive order could expand Cyber Command's spectrum of operations to include, for instance, assisting the Department of Homeland Security in defense of their networks.Some military leaders claim that the existing cultures of the Army, Navy, and Air Force are fundamentally incompatible with that of cyber warfare. Major Robert Costa (USAF) even suggested a sixth branch of the military, an Information (Cyber) Service with Title 10 responsibilities analogous to its sister services in 2002 noting: Others have also discussed the creation of a cyber-warfare branch. Lieutenant Colonel Gregory Conti and Colonel John "Buck" Surdu (chief of staff of the United States Army Research, Development and Engineering Command) stated that the three major services are "properly positioned to fight kinetic wars, and they value skills such as marksmanship, physical strength, the ability to leap out of airplanes and lead combat units under enemy fire."Conti and Surdu reasoned, "Adding an efficient and effective cyber branch alongside the Army, Navy and Air Force would provide our nation with the capability to defend our technological infrastructure and conduct offensive operations. Perhaps more important, the existence of this capability would serve as a strong deterrent for our nation's enemies."In response to concerns about the military's right to respond to cyber attacks, General Alexander stated "The U.S. must fire back against cyber attacks swiftly and strongly and should act to counter or disable a threat even when the identity of the attacker is unknown" prior to his confirmation hearings before the United States Congress. This came in response to incidents such as a 2008 operation to take down a government-run extremist honeypot in Saudi Arabia. "Elite U.S. military computer specialists, over the objections of the CIA, mounted a cyberattack that dismantled the online forum"."The new U.S. Cyber Command needs to strike a balance between protecting military assets and personal privacy." stated Alexander, in a Defense Department release. If confirmed, Alexander said, his main focus will be on building capacity and capability to secure the networks and educating the public on the command's intent."This command is not about an effort to militarize cyber space," he said. "Rather, it's about safeguarding our military assets."In July 2011, Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn announced in a conference that "We have, within Cyber Command, a full spectrum of capabilities, but the thrust of the strategy is defensive." "The strategy rests on five pillars, he said: treat cyber as a domain; employ more active defenses; support the Department of Homeland Security in protecting critical infrastructure networks; practice collective defense with allies and international partners; and reduce the advantages attackers have on the Internet."In 2013, USCYBERCOM held a classified exercise in which reserve officers (with extensive experience in their civilian cyber-security work) easily defeated active duty cyber warriors. In 2015 Eric Rosenbach, the principal cyber adviser to Defense Secretary Ash Carter, said DoD was looking at alternatives to staffing with just active-duty military. Beginning that year, USCYBERCOM added 133 teams (staffing out at 6,000 people), with the intent that at least 15% of the personnel would be reserve cyber operations airmen. These new teams had achieved "initial operating capability" (IOC) as of 21 October 2016. Officials noted that IOC is not the same as combat readiness, but is the first step in that direction.President Barack Obama's Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity was formed to develop a plan for protecting cyberspace. The commission released a report in December 2016. The report made 16 major recommendations regarding the intertwining roles of the military, government administration and the private sector in providing cyber security.President Trump indicated that he wanted a full review of Cyber Command during his bid for presidency. During his presidency, the Trump administration made Cyber Command a unified combatant command, and took other measures attempting to deter cyber attacks. However, the FBI reported that they logged a record number of complaints and economic losses in 2019, as cybercrime continued to grow.The creation of U.S. Cyber Command appears to have motivated other countries in this arena. In December 2009, South Korea announced the creation of a cyber warfare command. Reportedly, this was in response to North Korea's creation of a cyber warfare unit. In addition, the British GCHQ has begun preparing a cyber force. Furthermore, a shift in military interest in cyber warfare has motivated the creation of the first U.S. Cyber Warfare Intelligence Center. In 2010, China introduced a department dedicated to defensive cyber war and information security in response to the creation of USCYBERCOM.In June 2019, Russia has conceded that it is "possible" its electrical grid was under cyberattack by the United States. The "New York Times" reported that hackers from the U.S. Cyber Command planted malware potentially capable of disrupting the Russian electrical grid.Cyber command is using its 2021 exercise Cyber Flag 21-2 to improve its teams' tactics.
|
[
"Keith B. Alexander",
"Michael S. Rogers",
"Keith B. Alexander"
] |
|
Who was the chair of United States Cyber Command in 04/01/2014?
|
April 01, 2014
|
{
"text": [
"Jon M. Davis",
"Michael S. Rogers"
]
}
|
L2_Q1783579_P488_1
|
Michael S. Rogers is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Apr, 2014 to Dec, 2022.
Jon M. Davis is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Mar, 2014 to Apr, 2014.
Keith B. Alexander is the chair of United States Cyber Command from May, 2010 to Mar, 2014.
|
United States Cyber CommandUnited States Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) is one of the eleven unified combatant commands of the United States Department of Defense (DoD). It unifies the direction of cyberspace operations, strengthens DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrates and bolsters DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM was created in mid-2009 at the National Security Agency (NSA) headquarters in Fort George G. Meade, Maryland. It cooperates with NSA networks and has been concurrently headed by the director of the National Security Agency since its inception. While originally created with a defensive mission in mind, it has increasingly been viewed as an offensive force. On 18 August 2017, it was announced that USCYBERCOM would be elevated to the status of a full and independent unified combatant command. This elevation occurred on 4 May 2018.According to the US Department of Defense (DoD):The text "9ec4c12949a4f31474f299058ce2b22a", located in the command's emblem, is the MD5 hash of their mission statement.The command is charged with pulling together existing cyberspace resources, creating synergies and synchronizing war-fighting effects to defend the information security environment. USCYBERCOM is tasked with centralizing command of cyberspace operations, strengthening DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrating and bolstering DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM is an armed forces unified command under Department of Defense (DoD).U.S. Cyber Command is composed of several service components, units from military services who will provide Joint services to Cyber Command.In 2015, the U.S. Cyber Command added 133 new cyber teams. The breakdown was: An intention by the U.S. Air Force to create a 'cyber command' was announced in October 2006. An Air Force Cyber Command was created in a provisional status in November 2006. However, in October 2008, it was announced the command would not be brought into permanent activation.On 23 June 2009, the Secretary of Defense directed the Commander of U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM) to establish USCYBERCOM. In May 2010, General Keith Alexander outlined his views in a report for the United States House Committee on Armed Services subcommittee:Initial operational capability was attained on 21 May 2010. General Alexander was promoted to four-star rank, becoming one of 38 U.S. generals, and took charge of U.S. Cyber Command in a ceremony at Fort Meade that was attended by Commander of U.S. Central Command GEN David Petraeus, and Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates.USCYBERCOM reached full operational capability on 31 October 2010.The command assumed responsibility for several existing organizations. The Joint Task Force for Global Network Operations (JTF-GNO) and the Joint Functional Component Command for Network Warfare (JFCC-NW) were absorbed by the command. The Defense Information Systems Agency, where JTF-GNO operated, provides technical assistance for network and information assurance to USCYBERCOM, and is moving its headquarters to Fort Meade.President Obama signed into law, on 23 December 2016, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year (FY) 2017, which elevated USCYBERCOM to a unified combatant command. The FY 2017 NDAA also specified that the dual-hatted arrangement of the commander of USCYBERCOM will not be terminated until the Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff jointly certify that ending this arrangement will not pose risks to the military effectiveness of CYBERCOM that are unacceptable to the national security interests of the United States.There are concerns that the Pentagon and NSA will overshadow any civilian cyber defense efforts. There are also concerns on whether the command will assist in civilian cyber defense efforts. According to Deputy Secretary of Defense William J. Lynn, the command "will lead day-to-day defense and protection of all DoD networks. It will be responsible for DoD's networks – the dot-mil world. Responsibility for federal civilian networks – dot-gov – stays with the Department of Homeland Security, and that's exactly how it should be." Alexander notes, however, that if faced with cyber hostilities an executive order could expand Cyber Command's spectrum of operations to include, for instance, assisting the Department of Homeland Security in defense of their networks.Some military leaders claim that the existing cultures of the Army, Navy, and Air Force are fundamentally incompatible with that of cyber warfare. Major Robert Costa (USAF) even suggested a sixth branch of the military, an Information (Cyber) Service with Title 10 responsibilities analogous to its sister services in 2002 noting: Others have also discussed the creation of a cyber-warfare branch. Lieutenant Colonel Gregory Conti and Colonel John "Buck" Surdu (chief of staff of the United States Army Research, Development and Engineering Command) stated that the three major services are "properly positioned to fight kinetic wars, and they value skills such as marksmanship, physical strength, the ability to leap out of airplanes and lead combat units under enemy fire."Conti and Surdu reasoned, "Adding an efficient and effective cyber branch alongside the Army, Navy and Air Force would provide our nation with the capability to defend our technological infrastructure and conduct offensive operations. Perhaps more important, the existence of this capability would serve as a strong deterrent for our nation's enemies."In response to concerns about the military's right to respond to cyber attacks, General Alexander stated "The U.S. must fire back against cyber attacks swiftly and strongly and should act to counter or disable a threat even when the identity of the attacker is unknown" prior to his confirmation hearings before the United States Congress. This came in response to incidents such as a 2008 operation to take down a government-run extremist honeypot in Saudi Arabia. "Elite U.S. military computer specialists, over the objections of the CIA, mounted a cyberattack that dismantled the online forum"."The new U.S. Cyber Command needs to strike a balance between protecting military assets and personal privacy." stated Alexander, in a Defense Department release. If confirmed, Alexander said, his main focus will be on building capacity and capability to secure the networks and educating the public on the command's intent."This command is not about an effort to militarize cyber space," he said. "Rather, it's about safeguarding our military assets."In July 2011, Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn announced in a conference that "We have, within Cyber Command, a full spectrum of capabilities, but the thrust of the strategy is defensive." "The strategy rests on five pillars, he said: treat cyber as a domain; employ more active defenses; support the Department of Homeland Security in protecting critical infrastructure networks; practice collective defense with allies and international partners; and reduce the advantages attackers have on the Internet."In 2013, USCYBERCOM held a classified exercise in which reserve officers (with extensive experience in their civilian cyber-security work) easily defeated active duty cyber warriors. In 2015 Eric Rosenbach, the principal cyber adviser to Defense Secretary Ash Carter, said DoD was looking at alternatives to staffing with just active-duty military. Beginning that year, USCYBERCOM added 133 teams (staffing out at 6,000 people), with the intent that at least 15% of the personnel would be reserve cyber operations airmen. These new teams had achieved "initial operating capability" (IOC) as of 21 October 2016. Officials noted that IOC is not the same as combat readiness, but is the first step in that direction.President Barack Obama's Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity was formed to develop a plan for protecting cyberspace. The commission released a report in December 2016. The report made 16 major recommendations regarding the intertwining roles of the military, government administration and the private sector in providing cyber security.President Trump indicated that he wanted a full review of Cyber Command during his bid for presidency. During his presidency, the Trump administration made Cyber Command a unified combatant command, and took other measures attempting to deter cyber attacks. However, the FBI reported that they logged a record number of complaints and economic losses in 2019, as cybercrime continued to grow.The creation of U.S. Cyber Command appears to have motivated other countries in this arena. In December 2009, South Korea announced the creation of a cyber warfare command. Reportedly, this was in response to North Korea's creation of a cyber warfare unit. In addition, the British GCHQ has begun preparing a cyber force. Furthermore, a shift in military interest in cyber warfare has motivated the creation of the first U.S. Cyber Warfare Intelligence Center. In 2010, China introduced a department dedicated to defensive cyber war and information security in response to the creation of USCYBERCOM.In June 2019, Russia has conceded that it is "possible" its electrical grid was under cyberattack by the United States. The "New York Times" reported that hackers from the U.S. Cyber Command planted malware potentially capable of disrupting the Russian electrical grid.Cyber command is using its 2021 exercise Cyber Flag 21-2 to improve its teams' tactics.
|
[
"Keith B. Alexander",
"Michael S. Rogers",
"Keith B. Alexander"
] |
|
Who was the chair of United States Cyber Command in 01-Apr-201401-April-2014?
|
April 01, 2014
|
{
"text": [
"Jon M. Davis",
"Michael S. Rogers"
]
}
|
L2_Q1783579_P488_1
|
Michael S. Rogers is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Apr, 2014 to Dec, 2022.
Jon M. Davis is the chair of United States Cyber Command from Mar, 2014 to Apr, 2014.
Keith B. Alexander is the chair of United States Cyber Command from May, 2010 to Mar, 2014.
|
United States Cyber CommandUnited States Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) is one of the eleven unified combatant commands of the United States Department of Defense (DoD). It unifies the direction of cyberspace operations, strengthens DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrates and bolsters DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM was created in mid-2009 at the National Security Agency (NSA) headquarters in Fort George G. Meade, Maryland. It cooperates with NSA networks and has been concurrently headed by the director of the National Security Agency since its inception. While originally created with a defensive mission in mind, it has increasingly been viewed as an offensive force. On 18 August 2017, it was announced that USCYBERCOM would be elevated to the status of a full and independent unified combatant command. This elevation occurred on 4 May 2018.According to the US Department of Defense (DoD):The text "9ec4c12949a4f31474f299058ce2b22a", located in the command's emblem, is the MD5 hash of their mission statement.The command is charged with pulling together existing cyberspace resources, creating synergies and synchronizing war-fighting effects to defend the information security environment. USCYBERCOM is tasked with centralizing command of cyberspace operations, strengthening DoD cyberspace capabilities, and integrating and bolstering DoD's cyber expertise.USCYBERCOM is an armed forces unified command under Department of Defense (DoD).U.S. Cyber Command is composed of several service components, units from military services who will provide Joint services to Cyber Command.In 2015, the U.S. Cyber Command added 133 new cyber teams. The breakdown was: An intention by the U.S. Air Force to create a 'cyber command' was announced in October 2006. An Air Force Cyber Command was created in a provisional status in November 2006. However, in October 2008, it was announced the command would not be brought into permanent activation.On 23 June 2009, the Secretary of Defense directed the Commander of U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM) to establish USCYBERCOM. In May 2010, General Keith Alexander outlined his views in a report for the United States House Committee on Armed Services subcommittee:Initial operational capability was attained on 21 May 2010. General Alexander was promoted to four-star rank, becoming one of 38 U.S. generals, and took charge of U.S. Cyber Command in a ceremony at Fort Meade that was attended by Commander of U.S. Central Command GEN David Petraeus, and Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates.USCYBERCOM reached full operational capability on 31 October 2010.The command assumed responsibility for several existing organizations. The Joint Task Force for Global Network Operations (JTF-GNO) and the Joint Functional Component Command for Network Warfare (JFCC-NW) were absorbed by the command. The Defense Information Systems Agency, where JTF-GNO operated, provides technical assistance for network and information assurance to USCYBERCOM, and is moving its headquarters to Fort Meade.President Obama signed into law, on 23 December 2016, the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for fiscal year (FY) 2017, which elevated USCYBERCOM to a unified combatant command. The FY 2017 NDAA also specified that the dual-hatted arrangement of the commander of USCYBERCOM will not be terminated until the Secretary of Defense and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff jointly certify that ending this arrangement will not pose risks to the military effectiveness of CYBERCOM that are unacceptable to the national security interests of the United States.There are concerns that the Pentagon and NSA will overshadow any civilian cyber defense efforts. There are also concerns on whether the command will assist in civilian cyber defense efforts. According to Deputy Secretary of Defense William J. Lynn, the command "will lead day-to-day defense and protection of all DoD networks. It will be responsible for DoD's networks – the dot-mil world. Responsibility for federal civilian networks – dot-gov – stays with the Department of Homeland Security, and that's exactly how it should be." Alexander notes, however, that if faced with cyber hostilities an executive order could expand Cyber Command's spectrum of operations to include, for instance, assisting the Department of Homeland Security in defense of their networks.Some military leaders claim that the existing cultures of the Army, Navy, and Air Force are fundamentally incompatible with that of cyber warfare. Major Robert Costa (USAF) even suggested a sixth branch of the military, an Information (Cyber) Service with Title 10 responsibilities analogous to its sister services in 2002 noting: Others have also discussed the creation of a cyber-warfare branch. Lieutenant Colonel Gregory Conti and Colonel John "Buck" Surdu (chief of staff of the United States Army Research, Development and Engineering Command) stated that the three major services are "properly positioned to fight kinetic wars, and they value skills such as marksmanship, physical strength, the ability to leap out of airplanes and lead combat units under enemy fire."Conti and Surdu reasoned, "Adding an efficient and effective cyber branch alongside the Army, Navy and Air Force would provide our nation with the capability to defend our technological infrastructure and conduct offensive operations. Perhaps more important, the existence of this capability would serve as a strong deterrent for our nation's enemies."In response to concerns about the military's right to respond to cyber attacks, General Alexander stated "The U.S. must fire back against cyber attacks swiftly and strongly and should act to counter or disable a threat even when the identity of the attacker is unknown" prior to his confirmation hearings before the United States Congress. This came in response to incidents such as a 2008 operation to take down a government-run extremist honeypot in Saudi Arabia. "Elite U.S. military computer specialists, over the objections of the CIA, mounted a cyberattack that dismantled the online forum"."The new U.S. Cyber Command needs to strike a balance between protecting military assets and personal privacy." stated Alexander, in a Defense Department release. If confirmed, Alexander said, his main focus will be on building capacity and capability to secure the networks and educating the public on the command's intent."This command is not about an effort to militarize cyber space," he said. "Rather, it's about safeguarding our military assets."In July 2011, Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn announced in a conference that "We have, within Cyber Command, a full spectrum of capabilities, but the thrust of the strategy is defensive." "The strategy rests on five pillars, he said: treat cyber as a domain; employ more active defenses; support the Department of Homeland Security in protecting critical infrastructure networks; practice collective defense with allies and international partners; and reduce the advantages attackers have on the Internet."In 2013, USCYBERCOM held a classified exercise in which reserve officers (with extensive experience in their civilian cyber-security work) easily defeated active duty cyber warriors. In 2015 Eric Rosenbach, the principal cyber adviser to Defense Secretary Ash Carter, said DoD was looking at alternatives to staffing with just active-duty military. Beginning that year, USCYBERCOM added 133 teams (staffing out at 6,000 people), with the intent that at least 15% of the personnel would be reserve cyber operations airmen. These new teams had achieved "initial operating capability" (IOC) as of 21 October 2016. Officials noted that IOC is not the same as combat readiness, but is the first step in that direction.President Barack Obama's Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity was formed to develop a plan for protecting cyberspace. The commission released a report in December 2016. The report made 16 major recommendations regarding the intertwining roles of the military, government administration and the private sector in providing cyber security.President Trump indicated that he wanted a full review of Cyber Command during his bid for presidency. During his presidency, the Trump administration made Cyber Command a unified combatant command, and took other measures attempting to deter cyber attacks. However, the FBI reported that they logged a record number of complaints and economic losses in 2019, as cybercrime continued to grow.The creation of U.S. Cyber Command appears to have motivated other countries in this arena. In December 2009, South Korea announced the creation of a cyber warfare command. Reportedly, this was in response to North Korea's creation of a cyber warfare unit. In addition, the British GCHQ has begun preparing a cyber force. Furthermore, a shift in military interest in cyber warfare has motivated the creation of the first U.S. Cyber Warfare Intelligence Center. In 2010, China introduced a department dedicated to defensive cyber war and information security in response to the creation of USCYBERCOM.In June 2019, Russia has conceded that it is "possible" its electrical grid was under cyberattack by the United States. The "New York Times" reported that hackers from the U.S. Cyber Command planted malware potentially capable of disrupting the Russian electrical grid.Cyber command is using its 2021 exercise Cyber Flag 21-2 to improve its teams' tactics.
|
[
"Keith B. Alexander",
"Michael S. Rogers",
"Keith B. Alexander"
] |
|
Which position did Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet hold in May, 1919?
|
May 27, 1919
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q3132978_P39_3
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1918 to Oct, 1922.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1906 to Jan, 1910.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1910 to Nov, 1918.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Oct, 1900 to Jan, 1906.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom from Nov, 1922 to Nov, 1923.
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st BaronetSir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet (19 September 18584 June 1939) was an English journalist and Liberal Member of Parliament and government minister. Norman was educated privately in France and at Harvard University, where he obtained his B.A. For several years he worked on the editorial staff of the "Pall Mall Gazette" and later joined the editorial staff of the "Daily Chronicle", being appointed Assistant Editor of the latter in 1895. He retired from journalism in 1899. During this time he travelled widely in Canada and the United States and in Russia, Japan, China, Siam, Malaya and Central Asia. Much of the material included in the two volumes mentioned in the description was amassed during these tours. He was knighted in 1906 and made a baronet in 1915.Norman was born in Leicester, the son of Henry Norman, a merchant and local radical politician. Norman was educated at Leicester Collegiate School and Grove House School and later studied theology and philosophy at Leipzig and Harvard University. His family were Unitarians in religion and Norman first embarked in a career as a preacher but he gave up this calling and his religion on his return to England.In 1891 he married author Ménie Muriel Dowie (1867–1945) but they divorced in 1903 on the grounds of her adultery with a family friend, Edward Arthur Fitzgerald. Norman was awarded custody of their son Henry Nigel St Valery Norman who was born in 1897.In 1907 he married Florence Priscilla McLaren (1884–1964), the daughter of the wealthy industrialist and Liberal MP, Sir Charles McLaren. They had three children.In 1922 he purchased Ramster Hall, Chiddingfold, Guildford, Surrey with Lady Norman.Norman became a journalist working for the "Pall Mall Gazette" and the "New York Times." As a journalist he was famous for uncovering the truth behind the Dreyfuss Affair. He was on the staff of the "Daily Chronicle" from 1892, becoming assistant editor. Norman travelled extensively in the East, where he took a number of photographs that are held at Cambridge University. Later he founded and edited the magazine "The World's Work" (vols 1-42 1902-1923).He was appointed Assistant Postmaster-General in 1910 and his interest in international communications led to a number of appointments related to wireless and telegraphy, among them Chairman of the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy 1912, and Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee of 1920, the latter convened to draw up a complete wireless scheme for the Empire. He was an early advocate of wireless broadcasting, opening the All British Wireless Exhibition at the Royal Horticultural Hall, Westminster in 1922 at which he predicted the ubiquitous uptake, to a very sceptical press, of the technology into all homes.In other business, Norman was a director of a number of companies connected to the coal mining and iron trades industries.Sir Henry was the Munitions Inventions Department's permanent attaché to the French Ministry of Inventions. At the end of the war Sir Henry got involved in the detailed planning for a proposed transatlantic flight using a F.B.27. Vickers Vimy. This planning included the route to be flown and of course, the hangar facilities and the provision of fuel needed for preparation of the aircraft in Newfoundland.Norman was a Liberal Member of Parliament for Wolverhampton South from 1900 to 1910, and for Blackburn from 1910 to 1923. He was an advocate for a number of causes, notably women's suffrage. He was created Baronet of Honeyhanger in the Parish of Shottermill in the County of Surrey, in 1915. In 1918 he was admitted to the Privy Council. In January 1910 he was appointed Assistant Postmaster General, a position which fitted well with his interests in wireless communications. He sat on the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy in 1912. In 1914, he became the first President of the Derby Wireless Club, founded in 1911. He was Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee from 1919, (The Norman Committee), which recommended wireless communications covering a range of 2,000 miles. He contributed to government committees including chairing a Select Committee on Patent Medicines (specifically advertisements for them and fraudulent claims), on rent restrictions, on betting duty and on industrial paints. He championed the rights and regulation of motorists in the House of Commons even though he had himself been fined for speeding (30 mph) under a scheme he himself had advocated to the Royal Commission. Norman was appointed a Justice of the Peace for Surrey.Norman was a supporter of David Lloyd George, organising the Budget League in support of his People's Budget in 1909–10, personally representing Lloyd George in France on a number of occasions during the First World War, and helping organise the government's campaign during the "Coupon Election" of 1918.
|
[
"Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet hold in 1919-05-27?
|
May 27, 1919
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q3132978_P39_3
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1918 to Oct, 1922.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1906 to Jan, 1910.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1910 to Nov, 1918.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Oct, 1900 to Jan, 1906.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom from Nov, 1922 to Nov, 1923.
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st BaronetSir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet (19 September 18584 June 1939) was an English journalist and Liberal Member of Parliament and government minister. Norman was educated privately in France and at Harvard University, where he obtained his B.A. For several years he worked on the editorial staff of the "Pall Mall Gazette" and later joined the editorial staff of the "Daily Chronicle", being appointed Assistant Editor of the latter in 1895. He retired from journalism in 1899. During this time he travelled widely in Canada and the United States and in Russia, Japan, China, Siam, Malaya and Central Asia. Much of the material included in the two volumes mentioned in the description was amassed during these tours. He was knighted in 1906 and made a baronet in 1915.Norman was born in Leicester, the son of Henry Norman, a merchant and local radical politician. Norman was educated at Leicester Collegiate School and Grove House School and later studied theology and philosophy at Leipzig and Harvard University. His family were Unitarians in religion and Norman first embarked in a career as a preacher but he gave up this calling and his religion on his return to England.In 1891 he married author Ménie Muriel Dowie (1867–1945) but they divorced in 1903 on the grounds of her adultery with a family friend, Edward Arthur Fitzgerald. Norman was awarded custody of their son Henry Nigel St Valery Norman who was born in 1897.In 1907 he married Florence Priscilla McLaren (1884–1964), the daughter of the wealthy industrialist and Liberal MP, Sir Charles McLaren. They had three children.In 1922 he purchased Ramster Hall, Chiddingfold, Guildford, Surrey with Lady Norman.Norman became a journalist working for the "Pall Mall Gazette" and the "New York Times." As a journalist he was famous for uncovering the truth behind the Dreyfuss Affair. He was on the staff of the "Daily Chronicle" from 1892, becoming assistant editor. Norman travelled extensively in the East, where he took a number of photographs that are held at Cambridge University. Later he founded and edited the magazine "The World's Work" (vols 1-42 1902-1923).He was appointed Assistant Postmaster-General in 1910 and his interest in international communications led to a number of appointments related to wireless and telegraphy, among them Chairman of the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy 1912, and Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee of 1920, the latter convened to draw up a complete wireless scheme for the Empire. He was an early advocate of wireless broadcasting, opening the All British Wireless Exhibition at the Royal Horticultural Hall, Westminster in 1922 at which he predicted the ubiquitous uptake, to a very sceptical press, of the technology into all homes.In other business, Norman was a director of a number of companies connected to the coal mining and iron trades industries.Sir Henry was the Munitions Inventions Department's permanent attaché to the French Ministry of Inventions. At the end of the war Sir Henry got involved in the detailed planning for a proposed transatlantic flight using a F.B.27. Vickers Vimy. This planning included the route to be flown and of course, the hangar facilities and the provision of fuel needed for preparation of the aircraft in Newfoundland.Norman was a Liberal Member of Parliament for Wolverhampton South from 1900 to 1910, and for Blackburn from 1910 to 1923. He was an advocate for a number of causes, notably women's suffrage. He was created Baronet of Honeyhanger in the Parish of Shottermill in the County of Surrey, in 1915. In 1918 he was admitted to the Privy Council. In January 1910 he was appointed Assistant Postmaster General, a position which fitted well with his interests in wireless communications. He sat on the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy in 1912. In 1914, he became the first President of the Derby Wireless Club, founded in 1911. He was Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee from 1919, (The Norman Committee), which recommended wireless communications covering a range of 2,000 miles. He contributed to government committees including chairing a Select Committee on Patent Medicines (specifically advertisements for them and fraudulent claims), on rent restrictions, on betting duty and on industrial paints. He championed the rights and regulation of motorists in the House of Commons even though he had himself been fined for speeding (30 mph) under a scheme he himself had advocated to the Royal Commission. Norman was appointed a Justice of the Peace for Surrey.Norman was a supporter of David Lloyd George, organising the Budget League in support of his People's Budget in 1909–10, personally representing Lloyd George in France on a number of occasions during the First World War, and helping organise the government's campaign during the "Coupon Election" of 1918.
|
[
"Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet hold in 27/05/1919?
|
May 27, 1919
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q3132978_P39_3
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1918 to Oct, 1922.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1906 to Jan, 1910.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1910 to Nov, 1918.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Oct, 1900 to Jan, 1906.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom from Nov, 1922 to Nov, 1923.
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st BaronetSir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet (19 September 18584 June 1939) was an English journalist and Liberal Member of Parliament and government minister. Norman was educated privately in France and at Harvard University, where he obtained his B.A. For several years he worked on the editorial staff of the "Pall Mall Gazette" and later joined the editorial staff of the "Daily Chronicle", being appointed Assistant Editor of the latter in 1895. He retired from journalism in 1899. During this time he travelled widely in Canada and the United States and in Russia, Japan, China, Siam, Malaya and Central Asia. Much of the material included in the two volumes mentioned in the description was amassed during these tours. He was knighted in 1906 and made a baronet in 1915.Norman was born in Leicester, the son of Henry Norman, a merchant and local radical politician. Norman was educated at Leicester Collegiate School and Grove House School and later studied theology and philosophy at Leipzig and Harvard University. His family were Unitarians in religion and Norman first embarked in a career as a preacher but he gave up this calling and his religion on his return to England.In 1891 he married author Ménie Muriel Dowie (1867–1945) but they divorced in 1903 on the grounds of her adultery with a family friend, Edward Arthur Fitzgerald. Norman was awarded custody of their son Henry Nigel St Valery Norman who was born in 1897.In 1907 he married Florence Priscilla McLaren (1884–1964), the daughter of the wealthy industrialist and Liberal MP, Sir Charles McLaren. They had three children.In 1922 he purchased Ramster Hall, Chiddingfold, Guildford, Surrey with Lady Norman.Norman became a journalist working for the "Pall Mall Gazette" and the "New York Times." As a journalist he was famous for uncovering the truth behind the Dreyfuss Affair. He was on the staff of the "Daily Chronicle" from 1892, becoming assistant editor. Norman travelled extensively in the East, where he took a number of photographs that are held at Cambridge University. Later he founded and edited the magazine "The World's Work" (vols 1-42 1902-1923).He was appointed Assistant Postmaster-General in 1910 and his interest in international communications led to a number of appointments related to wireless and telegraphy, among them Chairman of the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy 1912, and Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee of 1920, the latter convened to draw up a complete wireless scheme for the Empire. He was an early advocate of wireless broadcasting, opening the All British Wireless Exhibition at the Royal Horticultural Hall, Westminster in 1922 at which he predicted the ubiquitous uptake, to a very sceptical press, of the technology into all homes.In other business, Norman was a director of a number of companies connected to the coal mining and iron trades industries.Sir Henry was the Munitions Inventions Department's permanent attaché to the French Ministry of Inventions. At the end of the war Sir Henry got involved in the detailed planning for a proposed transatlantic flight using a F.B.27. Vickers Vimy. This planning included the route to be flown and of course, the hangar facilities and the provision of fuel needed for preparation of the aircraft in Newfoundland.Norman was a Liberal Member of Parliament for Wolverhampton South from 1900 to 1910, and for Blackburn from 1910 to 1923. He was an advocate for a number of causes, notably women's suffrage. He was created Baronet of Honeyhanger in the Parish of Shottermill in the County of Surrey, in 1915. In 1918 he was admitted to the Privy Council. In January 1910 he was appointed Assistant Postmaster General, a position which fitted well with his interests in wireless communications. He sat on the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy in 1912. In 1914, he became the first President of the Derby Wireless Club, founded in 1911. He was Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee from 1919, (The Norman Committee), which recommended wireless communications covering a range of 2,000 miles. He contributed to government committees including chairing a Select Committee on Patent Medicines (specifically advertisements for them and fraudulent claims), on rent restrictions, on betting duty and on industrial paints. He championed the rights and regulation of motorists in the House of Commons even though he had himself been fined for speeding (30 mph) under a scheme he himself had advocated to the Royal Commission. Norman was appointed a Justice of the Peace for Surrey.Norman was a supporter of David Lloyd George, organising the Budget League in support of his People's Budget in 1909–10, personally representing Lloyd George in France on a number of occasions during the First World War, and helping organise the government's campaign during the "Coupon Election" of 1918.
|
[
"Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet hold in May 27, 1919?
|
May 27, 1919
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q3132978_P39_3
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1918 to Oct, 1922.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1906 to Jan, 1910.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1910 to Nov, 1918.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Oct, 1900 to Jan, 1906.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom from Nov, 1922 to Nov, 1923.
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st BaronetSir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet (19 September 18584 June 1939) was an English journalist and Liberal Member of Parliament and government minister. Norman was educated privately in France and at Harvard University, where he obtained his B.A. For several years he worked on the editorial staff of the "Pall Mall Gazette" and later joined the editorial staff of the "Daily Chronicle", being appointed Assistant Editor of the latter in 1895. He retired from journalism in 1899. During this time he travelled widely in Canada and the United States and in Russia, Japan, China, Siam, Malaya and Central Asia. Much of the material included in the two volumes mentioned in the description was amassed during these tours. He was knighted in 1906 and made a baronet in 1915.Norman was born in Leicester, the son of Henry Norman, a merchant and local radical politician. Norman was educated at Leicester Collegiate School and Grove House School and later studied theology and philosophy at Leipzig and Harvard University. His family were Unitarians in religion and Norman first embarked in a career as a preacher but he gave up this calling and his religion on his return to England.In 1891 he married author Ménie Muriel Dowie (1867–1945) but they divorced in 1903 on the grounds of her adultery with a family friend, Edward Arthur Fitzgerald. Norman was awarded custody of their son Henry Nigel St Valery Norman who was born in 1897.In 1907 he married Florence Priscilla McLaren (1884–1964), the daughter of the wealthy industrialist and Liberal MP, Sir Charles McLaren. They had three children.In 1922 he purchased Ramster Hall, Chiddingfold, Guildford, Surrey with Lady Norman.Norman became a journalist working for the "Pall Mall Gazette" and the "New York Times." As a journalist he was famous for uncovering the truth behind the Dreyfuss Affair. He was on the staff of the "Daily Chronicle" from 1892, becoming assistant editor. Norman travelled extensively in the East, where he took a number of photographs that are held at Cambridge University. Later he founded and edited the magazine "The World's Work" (vols 1-42 1902-1923).He was appointed Assistant Postmaster-General in 1910 and his interest in international communications led to a number of appointments related to wireless and telegraphy, among them Chairman of the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy 1912, and Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee of 1920, the latter convened to draw up a complete wireless scheme for the Empire. He was an early advocate of wireless broadcasting, opening the All British Wireless Exhibition at the Royal Horticultural Hall, Westminster in 1922 at which he predicted the ubiquitous uptake, to a very sceptical press, of the technology into all homes.In other business, Norman was a director of a number of companies connected to the coal mining and iron trades industries.Sir Henry was the Munitions Inventions Department's permanent attaché to the French Ministry of Inventions. At the end of the war Sir Henry got involved in the detailed planning for a proposed transatlantic flight using a F.B.27. Vickers Vimy. This planning included the route to be flown and of course, the hangar facilities and the provision of fuel needed for preparation of the aircraft in Newfoundland.Norman was a Liberal Member of Parliament for Wolverhampton South from 1900 to 1910, and for Blackburn from 1910 to 1923. He was an advocate for a number of causes, notably women's suffrage. He was created Baronet of Honeyhanger in the Parish of Shottermill in the County of Surrey, in 1915. In 1918 he was admitted to the Privy Council. In January 1910 he was appointed Assistant Postmaster General, a position which fitted well with his interests in wireless communications. He sat on the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy in 1912. In 1914, he became the first President of the Derby Wireless Club, founded in 1911. He was Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee from 1919, (The Norman Committee), which recommended wireless communications covering a range of 2,000 miles. He contributed to government committees including chairing a Select Committee on Patent Medicines (specifically advertisements for them and fraudulent claims), on rent restrictions, on betting duty and on industrial paints. He championed the rights and regulation of motorists in the House of Commons even though he had himself been fined for speeding (30 mph) under a scheme he himself had advocated to the Royal Commission. Norman was appointed a Justice of the Peace for Surrey.Norman was a supporter of David Lloyd George, organising the Budget League in support of his People's Budget in 1909–10, personally representing Lloyd George in France on a number of occasions during the First World War, and helping organise the government's campaign during the "Coupon Election" of 1918.
|
[
"Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet hold in 05/27/1919?
|
May 27, 1919
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q3132978_P39_3
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1918 to Oct, 1922.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1906 to Jan, 1910.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1910 to Nov, 1918.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Oct, 1900 to Jan, 1906.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom from Nov, 1922 to Nov, 1923.
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st BaronetSir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet (19 September 18584 June 1939) was an English journalist and Liberal Member of Parliament and government minister. Norman was educated privately in France and at Harvard University, where he obtained his B.A. For several years he worked on the editorial staff of the "Pall Mall Gazette" and later joined the editorial staff of the "Daily Chronicle", being appointed Assistant Editor of the latter in 1895. He retired from journalism in 1899. During this time he travelled widely in Canada and the United States and in Russia, Japan, China, Siam, Malaya and Central Asia. Much of the material included in the two volumes mentioned in the description was amassed during these tours. He was knighted in 1906 and made a baronet in 1915.Norman was born in Leicester, the son of Henry Norman, a merchant and local radical politician. Norman was educated at Leicester Collegiate School and Grove House School and later studied theology and philosophy at Leipzig and Harvard University. His family were Unitarians in religion and Norman first embarked in a career as a preacher but he gave up this calling and his religion on his return to England.In 1891 he married author Ménie Muriel Dowie (1867–1945) but they divorced in 1903 on the grounds of her adultery with a family friend, Edward Arthur Fitzgerald. Norman was awarded custody of their son Henry Nigel St Valery Norman who was born in 1897.In 1907 he married Florence Priscilla McLaren (1884–1964), the daughter of the wealthy industrialist and Liberal MP, Sir Charles McLaren. They had three children.In 1922 he purchased Ramster Hall, Chiddingfold, Guildford, Surrey with Lady Norman.Norman became a journalist working for the "Pall Mall Gazette" and the "New York Times." As a journalist he was famous for uncovering the truth behind the Dreyfuss Affair. He was on the staff of the "Daily Chronicle" from 1892, becoming assistant editor. Norman travelled extensively in the East, where he took a number of photographs that are held at Cambridge University. Later he founded and edited the magazine "The World's Work" (vols 1-42 1902-1923).He was appointed Assistant Postmaster-General in 1910 and his interest in international communications led to a number of appointments related to wireless and telegraphy, among them Chairman of the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy 1912, and Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee of 1920, the latter convened to draw up a complete wireless scheme for the Empire. He was an early advocate of wireless broadcasting, opening the All British Wireless Exhibition at the Royal Horticultural Hall, Westminster in 1922 at which he predicted the ubiquitous uptake, to a very sceptical press, of the technology into all homes.In other business, Norman was a director of a number of companies connected to the coal mining and iron trades industries.Sir Henry was the Munitions Inventions Department's permanent attaché to the French Ministry of Inventions. At the end of the war Sir Henry got involved in the detailed planning for a proposed transatlantic flight using a F.B.27. Vickers Vimy. This planning included the route to be flown and of course, the hangar facilities and the provision of fuel needed for preparation of the aircraft in Newfoundland.Norman was a Liberal Member of Parliament for Wolverhampton South from 1900 to 1910, and for Blackburn from 1910 to 1923. He was an advocate for a number of causes, notably women's suffrage. He was created Baronet of Honeyhanger in the Parish of Shottermill in the County of Surrey, in 1915. In 1918 he was admitted to the Privy Council. In January 1910 he was appointed Assistant Postmaster General, a position which fitted well with his interests in wireless communications. He sat on the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy in 1912. In 1914, he became the first President of the Derby Wireless Club, founded in 1911. He was Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee from 1919, (The Norman Committee), which recommended wireless communications covering a range of 2,000 miles. He contributed to government committees including chairing a Select Committee on Patent Medicines (specifically advertisements for them and fraudulent claims), on rent restrictions, on betting duty and on industrial paints. He championed the rights and regulation of motorists in the House of Commons even though he had himself been fined for speeding (30 mph) under a scheme he himself had advocated to the Royal Commission. Norman was appointed a Justice of the Peace for Surrey.Norman was a supporter of David Lloyd George, organising the Budget League in support of his People's Budget in 1909–10, personally representing Lloyd George in France on a number of occasions during the First World War, and helping organise the government's campaign during the "Coupon Election" of 1918.
|
[
"Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet hold in 27-May-191927-May-1919?
|
May 27, 1919
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q3132978_P39_3
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1918 to Oct, 1922.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1906 to Jan, 1910.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Dec, 1910 to Nov, 1918.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Oct, 1900 to Jan, 1906.
Sir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet holds the position of Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom from Nov, 1922 to Nov, 1923.
|
Sir Henry Norman, 1st BaronetSir Henry Norman, 1st Baronet (19 September 18584 June 1939) was an English journalist and Liberal Member of Parliament and government minister. Norman was educated privately in France and at Harvard University, where he obtained his B.A. For several years he worked on the editorial staff of the "Pall Mall Gazette" and later joined the editorial staff of the "Daily Chronicle", being appointed Assistant Editor of the latter in 1895. He retired from journalism in 1899. During this time he travelled widely in Canada and the United States and in Russia, Japan, China, Siam, Malaya and Central Asia. Much of the material included in the two volumes mentioned in the description was amassed during these tours. He was knighted in 1906 and made a baronet in 1915.Norman was born in Leicester, the son of Henry Norman, a merchant and local radical politician. Norman was educated at Leicester Collegiate School and Grove House School and later studied theology and philosophy at Leipzig and Harvard University. His family were Unitarians in religion and Norman first embarked in a career as a preacher but he gave up this calling and his religion on his return to England.In 1891 he married author Ménie Muriel Dowie (1867–1945) but they divorced in 1903 on the grounds of her adultery with a family friend, Edward Arthur Fitzgerald. Norman was awarded custody of their son Henry Nigel St Valery Norman who was born in 1897.In 1907 he married Florence Priscilla McLaren (1884–1964), the daughter of the wealthy industrialist and Liberal MP, Sir Charles McLaren. They had three children.In 1922 he purchased Ramster Hall, Chiddingfold, Guildford, Surrey with Lady Norman.Norman became a journalist working for the "Pall Mall Gazette" and the "New York Times." As a journalist he was famous for uncovering the truth behind the Dreyfuss Affair. He was on the staff of the "Daily Chronicle" from 1892, becoming assistant editor. Norman travelled extensively in the East, where he took a number of photographs that are held at Cambridge University. Later he founded and edited the magazine "The World's Work" (vols 1-42 1902-1923).He was appointed Assistant Postmaster-General in 1910 and his interest in international communications led to a number of appointments related to wireless and telegraphy, among them Chairman of the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy 1912, and Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee of 1920, the latter convened to draw up a complete wireless scheme for the Empire. He was an early advocate of wireless broadcasting, opening the All British Wireless Exhibition at the Royal Horticultural Hall, Westminster in 1922 at which he predicted the ubiquitous uptake, to a very sceptical press, of the technology into all homes.In other business, Norman was a director of a number of companies connected to the coal mining and iron trades industries.Sir Henry was the Munitions Inventions Department's permanent attaché to the French Ministry of Inventions. At the end of the war Sir Henry got involved in the detailed planning for a proposed transatlantic flight using a F.B.27. Vickers Vimy. This planning included the route to be flown and of course, the hangar facilities and the provision of fuel needed for preparation of the aircraft in Newfoundland.Norman was a Liberal Member of Parliament for Wolverhampton South from 1900 to 1910, and for Blackburn from 1910 to 1923. He was an advocate for a number of causes, notably women's suffrage. He was created Baronet of Honeyhanger in the Parish of Shottermill in the County of Surrey, in 1915. In 1918 he was admitted to the Privy Council. In January 1910 he was appointed Assistant Postmaster General, a position which fitted well with his interests in wireless communications. He sat on the War Office Committee on Wireless Telegraphy in 1912. In 1914, he became the first President of the Derby Wireless Club, founded in 1911. He was Chairman of the Imperial Wireless Telegraphy Committee from 1919, (The Norman Committee), which recommended wireless communications covering a range of 2,000 miles. He contributed to government committees including chairing a Select Committee on Patent Medicines (specifically advertisements for them and fraudulent claims), on rent restrictions, on betting duty and on industrial paints. He championed the rights and regulation of motorists in the House of Commons even though he had himself been fined for speeding (30 mph) under a scheme he himself had advocated to the Royal Commission. Norman was appointed a Justice of the Peace for Surrey.Norman was a supporter of David Lloyd George, organising the Budget League in support of his People's Budget in 1909–10, personally representing Lloyd George in France on a number of occasions during the First World War, and helping organise the government's campaign during the "Coupon Election" of 1918.
|
[
"Member of the 32nd Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 28th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 27th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 30th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Xavier de La Chevalerie hold in Feb, 1975?
|
February 09, 1975
|
{
"text": [
"ambassador of France to Senegal"
]
}
|
L2_Q3570823_P39_1
|
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Canada from Jan, 1977 to Jan, 1979.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Senegal from Jan, 1973 to Jan, 1977.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Japan from Jan, 1979 to Jan, 1982.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to the Holy See from Jan, 1983 to Jan, 1985.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Mexico from Jan, 1970 to Jan, 1973.
|
Xavier de La ChevalerieMarie-Emile Xavier Daufresne de La Chevalerie (28 January 1920 – 21 August 2004) was a French diplomat. From 1967 to 1969 he served as Chief of Staff to the President of France, Charles de Gaulle.Xavier de La Chevalerie was born in Paris on 28 January 1920 to Alyette (née de Beaulaincourt-Marles) and Christian Daufresne de La Chevalerie. He studied at the Lycée Saint-Louis-de-Gonzague in Paris and then at the University of Paris in the faculties of literature and law. After further studies at the École Libre des Sciences Politiques, he began his career shortly before the outbreak of World War II. In 1940 he joined the Free French Forces and served under General Philippe Leclerc in Africa. He subsequently served as a diplomatic aide at the French embassy in the United States when it re-opened in 1944 following the liberation of France.After the war, he served in a variety of diplomatic posts, primarily in North Africa, Asia, and the Levant. He and his cousin, Xavier de Beaulaincourt-Marles, who had served as Charles de Gaulle's private secretary since 1948, were part of de Gaulle's close entourage during the period of the so-called (1960-1968). Many of them, including de La Chevalerie, later served on the administrative council of the .From 1961 to 1962, de La Chevalerie served as Chief of Staff to the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and then held a similar post at the (Ministry of International Cooperation).In 1967, he was named Chief of Staff to President de Gaulle and served in that post until 1969 when de Gaulle resigned from office.Shortly after de Gaulle's resignation in 1969, de La Chevalerie was appointed ambassador to Mexico and resumed his diplomatic career. He subsequently served as France's ambassador to Gambia (1973-1977), Guinea-Bissau (1975-1977), Senegal (1975-1977), Canada (1977-1979), Japan (1979-1982), and the Vatican (1983-1985).De La Chevalerie was married to Marie-France (née Hislaire), the daughter of the Belgian journalist and writer, René Hislaire. The couple had seven children. Xavier de La Chevalerie died on 21 August 2004 in Saint Nazaire. His wife pre-deceased him in 1985.
|
[
"ambassador of France to Canada",
"ambassador of France to Japan",
"ambassador of France to Mexico",
"ambassador of France to the Holy See"
] |
|
Which position did Xavier de La Chevalerie hold in 1975-02-09?
|
February 09, 1975
|
{
"text": [
"ambassador of France to Senegal"
]
}
|
L2_Q3570823_P39_1
|
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Canada from Jan, 1977 to Jan, 1979.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Senegal from Jan, 1973 to Jan, 1977.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Japan from Jan, 1979 to Jan, 1982.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to the Holy See from Jan, 1983 to Jan, 1985.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Mexico from Jan, 1970 to Jan, 1973.
|
Xavier de La ChevalerieMarie-Emile Xavier Daufresne de La Chevalerie (28 January 1920 – 21 August 2004) was a French diplomat. From 1967 to 1969 he served as Chief of Staff to the President of France, Charles de Gaulle.Xavier de La Chevalerie was born in Paris on 28 January 1920 to Alyette (née de Beaulaincourt-Marles) and Christian Daufresne de La Chevalerie. He studied at the Lycée Saint-Louis-de-Gonzague in Paris and then at the University of Paris in the faculties of literature and law. After further studies at the École Libre des Sciences Politiques, he began his career shortly before the outbreak of World War II. In 1940 he joined the Free French Forces and served under General Philippe Leclerc in Africa. He subsequently served as a diplomatic aide at the French embassy in the United States when it re-opened in 1944 following the liberation of France.After the war, he served in a variety of diplomatic posts, primarily in North Africa, Asia, and the Levant. He and his cousin, Xavier de Beaulaincourt-Marles, who had served as Charles de Gaulle's private secretary since 1948, were part of de Gaulle's close entourage during the period of the so-called (1960-1968). Many of them, including de La Chevalerie, later served on the administrative council of the .From 1961 to 1962, de La Chevalerie served as Chief of Staff to the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and then held a similar post at the (Ministry of International Cooperation).In 1967, he was named Chief of Staff to President de Gaulle and served in that post until 1969 when de Gaulle resigned from office.Shortly after de Gaulle's resignation in 1969, de La Chevalerie was appointed ambassador to Mexico and resumed his diplomatic career. He subsequently served as France's ambassador to Gambia (1973-1977), Guinea-Bissau (1975-1977), Senegal (1975-1977), Canada (1977-1979), Japan (1979-1982), and the Vatican (1983-1985).De La Chevalerie was married to Marie-France (née Hislaire), the daughter of the Belgian journalist and writer, René Hislaire. The couple had seven children. Xavier de La Chevalerie died on 21 August 2004 in Saint Nazaire. His wife pre-deceased him in 1985.
|
[
"ambassador of France to Canada",
"ambassador of France to Japan",
"ambassador of France to Mexico",
"ambassador of France to the Holy See"
] |
|
Which position did Xavier de La Chevalerie hold in 09/02/1975?
|
February 09, 1975
|
{
"text": [
"ambassador of France to Senegal"
]
}
|
L2_Q3570823_P39_1
|
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Canada from Jan, 1977 to Jan, 1979.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Senegal from Jan, 1973 to Jan, 1977.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Japan from Jan, 1979 to Jan, 1982.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to the Holy See from Jan, 1983 to Jan, 1985.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Mexico from Jan, 1970 to Jan, 1973.
|
Xavier de La ChevalerieMarie-Emile Xavier Daufresne de La Chevalerie (28 January 1920 – 21 August 2004) was a French diplomat. From 1967 to 1969 he served as Chief of Staff to the President of France, Charles de Gaulle.Xavier de La Chevalerie was born in Paris on 28 January 1920 to Alyette (née de Beaulaincourt-Marles) and Christian Daufresne de La Chevalerie. He studied at the Lycée Saint-Louis-de-Gonzague in Paris and then at the University of Paris in the faculties of literature and law. After further studies at the École Libre des Sciences Politiques, he began his career shortly before the outbreak of World War II. In 1940 he joined the Free French Forces and served under General Philippe Leclerc in Africa. He subsequently served as a diplomatic aide at the French embassy in the United States when it re-opened in 1944 following the liberation of France.After the war, he served in a variety of diplomatic posts, primarily in North Africa, Asia, and the Levant. He and his cousin, Xavier de Beaulaincourt-Marles, who had served as Charles de Gaulle's private secretary since 1948, were part of de Gaulle's close entourage during the period of the so-called (1960-1968). Many of them, including de La Chevalerie, later served on the administrative council of the .From 1961 to 1962, de La Chevalerie served as Chief of Staff to the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and then held a similar post at the (Ministry of International Cooperation).In 1967, he was named Chief of Staff to President de Gaulle and served in that post until 1969 when de Gaulle resigned from office.Shortly after de Gaulle's resignation in 1969, de La Chevalerie was appointed ambassador to Mexico and resumed his diplomatic career. He subsequently served as France's ambassador to Gambia (1973-1977), Guinea-Bissau (1975-1977), Senegal (1975-1977), Canada (1977-1979), Japan (1979-1982), and the Vatican (1983-1985).De La Chevalerie was married to Marie-France (née Hislaire), the daughter of the Belgian journalist and writer, René Hislaire. The couple had seven children. Xavier de La Chevalerie died on 21 August 2004 in Saint Nazaire. His wife pre-deceased him in 1985.
|
[
"ambassador of France to Canada",
"ambassador of France to Japan",
"ambassador of France to Mexico",
"ambassador of France to the Holy See"
] |
|
Which position did Xavier de La Chevalerie hold in Feb 09, 1975?
|
February 09, 1975
|
{
"text": [
"ambassador of France to Senegal"
]
}
|
L2_Q3570823_P39_1
|
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Canada from Jan, 1977 to Jan, 1979.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Senegal from Jan, 1973 to Jan, 1977.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Japan from Jan, 1979 to Jan, 1982.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to the Holy See from Jan, 1983 to Jan, 1985.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Mexico from Jan, 1970 to Jan, 1973.
|
Xavier de La ChevalerieMarie-Emile Xavier Daufresne de La Chevalerie (28 January 1920 – 21 August 2004) was a French diplomat. From 1967 to 1969 he served as Chief of Staff to the President of France, Charles de Gaulle.Xavier de La Chevalerie was born in Paris on 28 January 1920 to Alyette (née de Beaulaincourt-Marles) and Christian Daufresne de La Chevalerie. He studied at the Lycée Saint-Louis-de-Gonzague in Paris and then at the University of Paris in the faculties of literature and law. After further studies at the École Libre des Sciences Politiques, he began his career shortly before the outbreak of World War II. In 1940 he joined the Free French Forces and served under General Philippe Leclerc in Africa. He subsequently served as a diplomatic aide at the French embassy in the United States when it re-opened in 1944 following the liberation of France.After the war, he served in a variety of diplomatic posts, primarily in North Africa, Asia, and the Levant. He and his cousin, Xavier de Beaulaincourt-Marles, who had served as Charles de Gaulle's private secretary since 1948, were part of de Gaulle's close entourage during the period of the so-called (1960-1968). Many of them, including de La Chevalerie, later served on the administrative council of the .From 1961 to 1962, de La Chevalerie served as Chief of Staff to the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and then held a similar post at the (Ministry of International Cooperation).In 1967, he was named Chief of Staff to President de Gaulle and served in that post until 1969 when de Gaulle resigned from office.Shortly after de Gaulle's resignation in 1969, de La Chevalerie was appointed ambassador to Mexico and resumed his diplomatic career. He subsequently served as France's ambassador to Gambia (1973-1977), Guinea-Bissau (1975-1977), Senegal (1975-1977), Canada (1977-1979), Japan (1979-1982), and the Vatican (1983-1985).De La Chevalerie was married to Marie-France (née Hislaire), the daughter of the Belgian journalist and writer, René Hislaire. The couple had seven children. Xavier de La Chevalerie died on 21 August 2004 in Saint Nazaire. His wife pre-deceased him in 1985.
|
[
"ambassador of France to Canada",
"ambassador of France to Japan",
"ambassador of France to Mexico",
"ambassador of France to the Holy See"
] |
|
Which position did Xavier de La Chevalerie hold in 02/09/1975?
|
February 09, 1975
|
{
"text": [
"ambassador of France to Senegal"
]
}
|
L2_Q3570823_P39_1
|
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Canada from Jan, 1977 to Jan, 1979.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Senegal from Jan, 1973 to Jan, 1977.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Japan from Jan, 1979 to Jan, 1982.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to the Holy See from Jan, 1983 to Jan, 1985.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Mexico from Jan, 1970 to Jan, 1973.
|
Xavier de La ChevalerieMarie-Emile Xavier Daufresne de La Chevalerie (28 January 1920 – 21 August 2004) was a French diplomat. From 1967 to 1969 he served as Chief of Staff to the President of France, Charles de Gaulle.Xavier de La Chevalerie was born in Paris on 28 January 1920 to Alyette (née de Beaulaincourt-Marles) and Christian Daufresne de La Chevalerie. He studied at the Lycée Saint-Louis-de-Gonzague in Paris and then at the University of Paris in the faculties of literature and law. After further studies at the École Libre des Sciences Politiques, he began his career shortly before the outbreak of World War II. In 1940 he joined the Free French Forces and served under General Philippe Leclerc in Africa. He subsequently served as a diplomatic aide at the French embassy in the United States when it re-opened in 1944 following the liberation of France.After the war, he served in a variety of diplomatic posts, primarily in North Africa, Asia, and the Levant. He and his cousin, Xavier de Beaulaincourt-Marles, who had served as Charles de Gaulle's private secretary since 1948, were part of de Gaulle's close entourage during the period of the so-called (1960-1968). Many of them, including de La Chevalerie, later served on the administrative council of the .From 1961 to 1962, de La Chevalerie served as Chief of Staff to the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and then held a similar post at the (Ministry of International Cooperation).In 1967, he was named Chief of Staff to President de Gaulle and served in that post until 1969 when de Gaulle resigned from office.Shortly after de Gaulle's resignation in 1969, de La Chevalerie was appointed ambassador to Mexico and resumed his diplomatic career. He subsequently served as France's ambassador to Gambia (1973-1977), Guinea-Bissau (1975-1977), Senegal (1975-1977), Canada (1977-1979), Japan (1979-1982), and the Vatican (1983-1985).De La Chevalerie was married to Marie-France (née Hislaire), the daughter of the Belgian journalist and writer, René Hislaire. The couple had seven children. Xavier de La Chevalerie died on 21 August 2004 in Saint Nazaire. His wife pre-deceased him in 1985.
|
[
"ambassador of France to Canada",
"ambassador of France to Japan",
"ambassador of France to Mexico",
"ambassador of France to the Holy See"
] |
|
Which position did Xavier de La Chevalerie hold in 09-Feb-197509-February-1975?
|
February 09, 1975
|
{
"text": [
"ambassador of France to Senegal"
]
}
|
L2_Q3570823_P39_1
|
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Canada from Jan, 1977 to Jan, 1979.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Senegal from Jan, 1973 to Jan, 1977.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Japan from Jan, 1979 to Jan, 1982.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to the Holy See from Jan, 1983 to Jan, 1985.
Xavier de La Chevalerie holds the position of ambassador of France to Mexico from Jan, 1970 to Jan, 1973.
|
Xavier de La ChevalerieMarie-Emile Xavier Daufresne de La Chevalerie (28 January 1920 – 21 August 2004) was a French diplomat. From 1967 to 1969 he served as Chief of Staff to the President of France, Charles de Gaulle.Xavier de La Chevalerie was born in Paris on 28 January 1920 to Alyette (née de Beaulaincourt-Marles) and Christian Daufresne de La Chevalerie. He studied at the Lycée Saint-Louis-de-Gonzague in Paris and then at the University of Paris in the faculties of literature and law. After further studies at the École Libre des Sciences Politiques, he began his career shortly before the outbreak of World War II. In 1940 he joined the Free French Forces and served under General Philippe Leclerc in Africa. He subsequently served as a diplomatic aide at the French embassy in the United States when it re-opened in 1944 following the liberation of France.After the war, he served in a variety of diplomatic posts, primarily in North Africa, Asia, and the Levant. He and his cousin, Xavier de Beaulaincourt-Marles, who had served as Charles de Gaulle's private secretary since 1948, were part of de Gaulle's close entourage during the period of the so-called (1960-1968). Many of them, including de La Chevalerie, later served on the administrative council of the .From 1961 to 1962, de La Chevalerie served as Chief of Staff to the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and then held a similar post at the (Ministry of International Cooperation).In 1967, he was named Chief of Staff to President de Gaulle and served in that post until 1969 when de Gaulle resigned from office.Shortly after de Gaulle's resignation in 1969, de La Chevalerie was appointed ambassador to Mexico and resumed his diplomatic career. He subsequently served as France's ambassador to Gambia (1973-1977), Guinea-Bissau (1975-1977), Senegal (1975-1977), Canada (1977-1979), Japan (1979-1982), and the Vatican (1983-1985).De La Chevalerie was married to Marie-France (née Hislaire), the daughter of the Belgian journalist and writer, René Hislaire. The couple had seven children. Xavier de La Chevalerie died on 21 August 2004 in Saint Nazaire. His wife pre-deceased him in 1985.
|
[
"ambassador of France to Canada",
"ambassador of France to Japan",
"ambassador of France to Mexico",
"ambassador of France to the Holy See"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team PFC Levski Sofia in Jan, 2015?
|
January 02, 2015
|
{
"text": [
"Stoycho Stoev"
]
}
|
L2_Q144190_P286_0
|
Georgi Todorov (football manager) is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jun, 2020 to Oct, 2020.
Elin Topuzakov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Oct, 2016 to Mar, 2017.
Stanimir Stoilov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Sep, 2021 to Dec, 2022.
Slaviša Stojanovič is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jul, 2018 to Jan, 2019.
Stoycho Stoev is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Dec, 2014 to May, 2016.
|
PFC Levski SofiaLevski Sofia () is a Bulgarian professional association football club based in Sofia, which competes in the First League, the top division of the Bulgarian football league system. The club was founded on 24 May 1914 as a football department of Levski Sofia sports club by a group of students, and is named after Vasil Levski, a Bulgarian revolutionary renowned as the national hero of the country.Levski has won a total of 73 trophies, including 26 national titles, 25 national cups and 3 supercups, as well as 13 domestic Doubles and 1 Treble. It is also the only Bulgarian football club to have never been relegated from the top division since the establishment of the league system in 1937. Levski has reached the quarter-finals of UEFA competitions for five times, was runner-up of the Balkans Cup twice, and in 2006, it became the first Bulgarian club to enter the group stage of the UEFA Champions League.The team's regular kit colour is all-blue. Levskis home ground is the Vivacom Arena - Georgi Asparuhov in Sofia, which has a capacity of 25,000 spectators. The club's biggest rivals are CSKA Sofia, and matches between the two capital sides are commonly referred to as the Eternal derby of Bulgaria. Levski is also a regular member of the European Club Association and the European Multisport Club Association.Sport Club Levski was founded in 1911 by a group of secondary school students in Sofia. The club's name was chosen in honour of the Bulgarian revolutionary Vasil Levski, and the club was officially registered on 24 May 1914.In 1914, Levski lost its first official match against FC 13 Sofia with the score 2–0. Between 1914 and 1920, football wasn't a popular sport in Bulgaria, and no additional information about the club exists. In the summer of 1921, the Sofia Sports League was established, which united ten clubs from Sofia and marked the beginning of organized football competitions in the city. Levski won the first match in the championship in the 1921–22 season, held on 18 September 1921, against Athletic Sofia with the score of 3–1. The team captured first place in the league in 1923 after a 3–2 win over bitter rivals Slavia Sofia, and successfully defended the title the following season.The first National Championship was held in 1924 with Levski representing Sofia. The team went on to win the title in 1933, 1937 and 1942, and established itself as the most popular football club in Bulgaria. In 1929, Levski became the first semi-professional football club in Bulgaria, after twelve players staged a boycott of the team in demand of financial remuneration and insurance benefits. The same year Levski met its first international opponents, losing to Gallipoli Istanbul 1–0 and winning against Kuban Istanbul 6–0. Between 1930 and 1932, Levski won the Ulpia Serdica Cup for three consecutive years and was permanently awarded the trophy as a result.After World War II, Levski became one of the two top clubs in Bulgaria. After winning the championship in 1946, 1947, 1949, 1950 and 1953, Levski would not capture the domestic title again until the mid-1960s. In 1949, the authorities changed the club's name to Dinamo following the Soviet traditions, but after the de-Stalinization of Bulgaria, it was reverted in 1957. The 1960s were marked with return to success both on the domestic and on the international stage. Levski's academy would become the most successful in national youth competitions for the years to come, and the results were first seen in the likes of Georgi Asparuhov, Georgi Sokolov, Biser Mihaylov, Kiril Ivkov, Ivan Vutsov, Stefan Aladzhov and Aleksandar Kostov, assisted by experienced veterans like Stefan Abadzhiev, Dimo Pechenikov and Hristo Iliev, which resulted in winning the championship in 1965, 1968 and 1970, including the 7–2 triumph over new bitter rivals CSKA Sofia in 1968. In the 1965–66 European Cup, Levski was eliminated in the first round by Benfica with 5–4 on aggregate.In January 1969, Levski was forcibly merged with Spartak Sofia by the Bulgarian Communist Party, and put under the auspice of the Ministry of Interior Affairs. The name of the club was once again changed, this time to Levski-Spartak.A new crop of youngsters in the likes of Kiril Milanov, Dobromir Zhechev, Pavel Panov, Yordan Yordanov, Stefan Staykov, Tomas Lafchis, Todor Barzov, Voyn Voynov, Georgi Tsvetkov, Plamen Nikolov, and Rusi Gochev not only found their place in the first team, but brought new league titles in 1974, 1977, 1979, 1984 and 1985. On the international stage, the team reached the quarter-finals of the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1969–70 and 1976–77, and the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup in 1975–76. In the latter, Levski defeated Barcelona 5–4 in the second leg, becoming one of the two European teams (the other being Bayern Munich) to have scored five or more goals in one match against Barcelona in official UEFA competitions. Additionally, Levski became the only Bulgarian club to eliminate a German champion after defeating VfB Stuttgart in the first round of the 1984–85 European Cup. They also eliminated Stuttgart a year earlier in the first round of the 1983–84 UEFA Cup.The name of the team was changed to Vitosha by the authorities following the disruptions during and after the Bulgarian Cup final in 1985. The game ran on high emotions fuelled by the streak of consecutive victories of Levski over CSKA in the two years prior to the game. During the game, which CSKA won 2–1, there were confrontations both on the field and on the stands. By decree of the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party, some of the leading players of both clubs were suspended from the sport for life. The championship title of the club for 1985 was suspended. However, the suspensions were lifted shortly after. Levski won another cup and league titles in 1986 and 1988, respectively. The fourth European quarter-final came in 1986–87, when Levski knocked out the 1985–86 Danish Cup winners Boldklubben 1903 and the 1985–86 Yugoslav Cup holders Velež Mostar, before losing to the 1985–86 Copa del Rey winners Real Zaragoza.After the 1989–90 season, the club regained its original name. The team was made up of players such as Plamen Nikolov, Petar Hubchev, Tsanko Tsvetanov, Emil Kremenliev, Zlatko Yankov, Georgi Slavchev, Ilian Iliev, Daniel Borimirov, Stanimir Stoilov, Velko Yotov, Plamen Getov, Nikolay Todorov and Nasko Sirakov, and won three consecutive domestic national championships in 1993, 1994 and 1995. Levski contributed seven players (Tsvetanov, Kremenliev, Yankov, Sirakov, Nikolov, Petar Aleksandrov and Borimirov), more than any other Bulgarian team, to the Bulgaria national football team that finished in fourth place at the 1994 FIFA World Cup.In 2005–06, Levski reached the quarter-finals of the 2005–06 UEFA Cup after knocking out the 2004–05 Coupe de France winners Auxerre in the first round, finishing above SC Heerenveen, Dinamo București and the reigning title holders CSKA Moscow in the group stage, triumphing over Champions League participants Artmedia Bratislava and Udinese in the knockout stages, before being eliminated by Schalke 04.Levski, as the champions of Bulgaria, started their 2006–07 UEFA Champions League participation in the second qualiftying round, where they eliminated Georgian champions Sioni Bolnisi, defeating them 2–0 both home and away. In the third round, Levski faced Italian team Chievo Verona, which took part in the tournament because of other clubs' sanctions as part of the 2006 Serie A matchfixing scandal. Levski eliminated Chievo after a decisive 2–0 win in Sofia and a 2–2 draw in Verona, and thus became the first Bulgarian club to ever reach the group stage of the UEFA Champions League. There, they faced the title holders Barcelona, Premier League champions Chelsea, and Werder Bremen. They lost all six games and scored only one goal, in the second round against Chelsea.Levski earned a place in the 2008–09 UEFA Champions League after the Bulgarian league champions CSKA Sofia failed to obtain a UEFA license. Levski lost to BATE Borisov of Belarus in the third qualifying round.During the 2009–10 season, Levski's team started their European campaign with a 9–0 (on aggregate) win against UE Sant Julià in the second qualifying round of the 2009–10 UEFA Champions League. In the next round, Levski Sofia faced FK Baku, eliminating the team from Azerbaijan with 2–0 on aggregate. In the play-off round, Levski was eliminated by Debrecen with 4–1 on aggregate. As one of the play-off losers, Levski qualified for the 2009–10 UEFA Europa League. In the group stage, Levski faced Villarreal, Lazio and Red Bull Salzburg. Levski achieved only one win and five defeats. Levski took the win against Lazio in Italy, after Hristo Yovov scored the winning goal in the match.Levski started the 2010–11 season with a match against Dundalk, in a second qualifying round of the 2010–11 UEFA Europa League. Levski won the first match 6–0. In the return leg at Oriel Park, Levski defeated Dundalk 2–0 with two first half goals from Garra Dembélé. In the next round Levski played against Kalmar FF. The first match ended 1–1 in Sweden. In the return leg in Sofia, Levski won 5–2. In between, The Blues defeated their archrival CSKA Sofia in the Eternal derby with 1–0. Their next match in the Europa League saw them play against AIK Fotboll from Stockholm, Sweden. The first match ended in a goalless draw, and after the game, AIK hooligans attacked the Levski players and staff. The second match ended in a 2–1 home win for Levski. Goals scored by Daniel Mladenov and Garra Dembélé put Levski in the Europa League group stage. Levski was drawn in Group C, facing Gent, Lille and Sporting CP. The first match was played against Gent at home, which Levski won 3–2 with the winning goal scored by Serginho Greene. With this win, Levski recorded eight consecutive games without a defeat in European competitions. After that, Levski lost to Sporting CP with 5–0, followed by another defeat against Lille. In Sofia, Levski played well against Lille and was leading 2–1 until Ivo Ivanov scored an own goal to make it 2–2. In the last match of the Group C, Levski took a win against Sporting CP with 1–0, with the winning goal scored by Daniel Mladenov.In the following 2011–12 season, in the third qualifying round of the Europa League, Levski were eliminated by Spartak Trnava of Slovakia, following a late game 2–1 win in Sofia, and a loss of the same scoreline in Trnava. The penalty shoot-out costed Levski a place in the play-off round. This caused an upset with the fans and players, and the team barely clinched the fourth place at the winter break in the Bulgarian league. Albeit only three points from the leaders Ludogoretz Razgrad, the acting manager Georgi Ivanov was sacked from the position, but remained at the club as a sporting director. Nikolay Kostov was appointed the new manager of the club, giving the supporters a sense of optimism, which, however, faded after a cup knock-out in the hands of Lokomotiv Plovdiv and a home defeat to Minyor Pernik. Kostov handed in his resignation, leaving the managerial post once again vacant. Sporting director Georgi Ivanov once again stepped in to help the club, and accepted being the manager until the summer break, when a new one would be appointed.During the summer of 2012, former player Ilian Iliev was appointed the new manager of the club. Under his management, Levski was knocked out from the Europa League by Bosnian side FK Sarajevo. Iliev led the team to 13 league victories and to the semi-finals of the Bulgarian Cup after eliminating Cherno More Varna and Litex Lovech on the away goals rule. Iliev however was sacked after a 1–1 away draw against Pirin Gotse Delchev. Assistant manager Nikolay Mitov took over the team until the end of the season. Under his management Levski won the derby clashes against Litex, CSKA and Ludogorets but failed to win the title after a 1–1 home draw against Slavia Sofia. Levski also reached their first Bulgarian Cup final since 2007, but lost on penalties against Beroe Stara Zagora. Despite the missed opportunity of winning a trophy, Mitov's contract was renewed for the 2013–14 season. However, the team made another disappointing performance in Europa League, being eliminated by the Kazakh side Irtysh Pavlodar. As a result, Nikolay Mitov resigned as manager.In July 2013 Slaviša Jokanović was appointed as the new manager of the team. Despite losing only two matches in twelve games, Jokanović was released in October 2013. Ivaylo Petev was announced as his successor but during his introduction a few Levski supporters interrupted it, stating that they would not accept his appointment. The next day, Petev refused to take charge of the team and Antoni Zdravkov was named as the new manager. Under his reign the team suffered a heavy 3–0 loss against rivals CSKA, but managed to knock them out in the Bulgarian Cup in December 2013 after penalties. Due to the difficult financial situation, a few key players, such as Antonio Vutov and Garry Rodrigues, were sold to Udinese and Elche, respectively, during the winter break. This reflected on the team's performance and Levski finished fifth and got knocked out in the quarter-finals of the Bulgarian Cup by Botev Plovdiv. Antoni Zdravkov was sacked in March 2014, and Levski legend Elin Topuzakov took charge as a caretaker until the end of the 2013–14 season. For the first time since 1990–91 the club did not participate in European competitions.On 23 May 2014, the club supporters organized a friendly game against Lazio, marking the 100th anniversary of the club. Club icons like Georgi Ivanov, Dimitar Ivankov, Aleksandar Aleksandrov, Hristo Yovov, Elin Topuzakov and many other former players and celebrities took participation by playing in the game, as well as donating money for the event's organization. The next day, Levski marked 100 years since its founding. As of 2020, the results from a decade of incompetent management have finally come out, putting the club in a financial crisis and on the verge of bankruptcy. In the summer of 2020, club legend Nasko Sirakov took charge of the majority of shares and the club made some financial cuts, forcing a big part of the players (mainly foreigners) to leave. Levski also changed its transfer policy, signing mainly Bulgarian and homegrown players with lower salaries, allowing the club to start paying off some of the debt accumulated throughout the years. Sirakov set a target for the club to clear most of the debt by 2023, mostly through sponsorship deals, outgoing transfers, television rights and the fans' financial support.The first club crest was designed by Mincho Kachulev in 1922. Initially in the size of a square with a blue background, it was intentionally written in a stylized letter "Л" (Bulgarian letter "L"; shortened for Levski). The inner space of the letter was filled vertically equally in yellow and red colours. In a later period of time, the Cyrillic letters "С" (Sport) and "К" (club) were added at the top of the square, while the bottom side was inscribed with the name "Sofia". This badge was used by the club until 1949, when it was renamed to Dinamo.From 1949 to 1956, the emblem of the club was an irregular hexagon filled with vertical red, white, blue and yellow colours, with an inscribed handwritten Cyrillic letter "Д", alongside a five-pointed red star above it and the word "Sofia" underneath.From 1957 to 1968 the original logo of the club was restored, however the letters C" and "К" were replaced with "Ф" (Athletic) and "Д" (union).After the merger with Spartak Sofia in 1969, the club crest has been a shield in blue and white with a horizontal red bar above. The shield spawned the letters "Л" and "C", an abbreviation of the new name Levski-Spartak. The football club used this crest until 1985, when it was renamed Vitosha. Vitosha's crest was in the form of a stylized letter "C" surrounding the football in the upper curve of the letter, coloured in blue and white.In January 1990, the club restored its original name and original logo, and the letters "C" and "K" in the upper corner of the blue square were replaced with the initials "Ф" (football) and "K" (club). However, due to legal issues with the ownership of the rights to the historic crest, the club was forced to change it in 1998, when a brand new shield logo was introduced, entirely in blue. At its centre, an inscription of the letter "Л" was introduced, alongside the year of establishment – 1914. The dome of the shield was labelled "PFC Levski".After winning the legal dispute for the rights to the historic emblem in 2006, the club decided to use the two different logos simultaneously for a brief period of time. Later that year, the shield crest was completely removed and the classic square emblem has been used since."For recent transfers, see Transfers summer 2021."Up to five non-EU nationals can be registered and given a squad number for the first team in the Bulgarian First League; however, only three can be used during a match day. Those non-EU nationals with European ancestry can claim citizenship from the nation their ancestors came from. If a player does not have European ancestry he can claim Bulgarian citizenship after playing in Bulgaria for five years.Note: "For a complete list of Levski Sofia players, see ." "Players with at least one appearance for the Bulgarian national team.""Foreign players with at least 30 games for the club or that are record holders. Players who were internationally capped for their country while playing for Levski are listed in bold."EuropeSouth AmericaAfricaOfficial websitesFan websites
|
[
"Stanimir Stoilov",
"Elin Topuzakov",
"Slaviša Stojanovič",
"Georgi Todorov (football manager)"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team PFC Levski Sofia in 2015-01-02?
|
January 02, 2015
|
{
"text": [
"Stoycho Stoev"
]
}
|
L2_Q144190_P286_0
|
Georgi Todorov (football manager) is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jun, 2020 to Oct, 2020.
Elin Topuzakov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Oct, 2016 to Mar, 2017.
Stanimir Stoilov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Sep, 2021 to Dec, 2022.
Slaviša Stojanovič is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jul, 2018 to Jan, 2019.
Stoycho Stoev is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Dec, 2014 to May, 2016.
|
PFC Levski SofiaLevski Sofia () is a Bulgarian professional association football club based in Sofia, which competes in the First League, the top division of the Bulgarian football league system. The club was founded on 24 May 1914 as a football department of Levski Sofia sports club by a group of students, and is named after Vasil Levski, a Bulgarian revolutionary renowned as the national hero of the country.Levski has won a total of 73 trophies, including 26 national titles, 25 national cups and 3 supercups, as well as 13 domestic Doubles and 1 Treble. It is also the only Bulgarian football club to have never been relegated from the top division since the establishment of the league system in 1937. Levski has reached the quarter-finals of UEFA competitions for five times, was runner-up of the Balkans Cup twice, and in 2006, it became the first Bulgarian club to enter the group stage of the UEFA Champions League.The team's regular kit colour is all-blue. Levskis home ground is the Vivacom Arena - Georgi Asparuhov in Sofia, which has a capacity of 25,000 spectators. The club's biggest rivals are CSKA Sofia, and matches between the two capital sides are commonly referred to as the Eternal derby of Bulgaria. Levski is also a regular member of the European Club Association and the European Multisport Club Association.Sport Club Levski was founded in 1911 by a group of secondary school students in Sofia. The club's name was chosen in honour of the Bulgarian revolutionary Vasil Levski, and the club was officially registered on 24 May 1914.In 1914, Levski lost its first official match against FC 13 Sofia with the score 2–0. Between 1914 and 1920, football wasn't a popular sport in Bulgaria, and no additional information about the club exists. In the summer of 1921, the Sofia Sports League was established, which united ten clubs from Sofia and marked the beginning of organized football competitions in the city. Levski won the first match in the championship in the 1921–22 season, held on 18 September 1921, against Athletic Sofia with the score of 3–1. The team captured first place in the league in 1923 after a 3–2 win over bitter rivals Slavia Sofia, and successfully defended the title the following season.The first National Championship was held in 1924 with Levski representing Sofia. The team went on to win the title in 1933, 1937 and 1942, and established itself as the most popular football club in Bulgaria. In 1929, Levski became the first semi-professional football club in Bulgaria, after twelve players staged a boycott of the team in demand of financial remuneration and insurance benefits. The same year Levski met its first international opponents, losing to Gallipoli Istanbul 1–0 and winning against Kuban Istanbul 6–0. Between 1930 and 1932, Levski won the Ulpia Serdica Cup for three consecutive years and was permanently awarded the trophy as a result.After World War II, Levski became one of the two top clubs in Bulgaria. After winning the championship in 1946, 1947, 1949, 1950 and 1953, Levski would not capture the domestic title again until the mid-1960s. In 1949, the authorities changed the club's name to Dinamo following the Soviet traditions, but after the de-Stalinization of Bulgaria, it was reverted in 1957. The 1960s were marked with return to success both on the domestic and on the international stage. Levski's academy would become the most successful in national youth competitions for the years to come, and the results were first seen in the likes of Georgi Asparuhov, Georgi Sokolov, Biser Mihaylov, Kiril Ivkov, Ivan Vutsov, Stefan Aladzhov and Aleksandar Kostov, assisted by experienced veterans like Stefan Abadzhiev, Dimo Pechenikov and Hristo Iliev, which resulted in winning the championship in 1965, 1968 and 1970, including the 7–2 triumph over new bitter rivals CSKA Sofia in 1968. In the 1965–66 European Cup, Levski was eliminated in the first round by Benfica with 5–4 on aggregate.In January 1969, Levski was forcibly merged with Spartak Sofia by the Bulgarian Communist Party, and put under the auspice of the Ministry of Interior Affairs. The name of the club was once again changed, this time to Levski-Spartak.A new crop of youngsters in the likes of Kiril Milanov, Dobromir Zhechev, Pavel Panov, Yordan Yordanov, Stefan Staykov, Tomas Lafchis, Todor Barzov, Voyn Voynov, Georgi Tsvetkov, Plamen Nikolov, and Rusi Gochev not only found their place in the first team, but brought new league titles in 1974, 1977, 1979, 1984 and 1985. On the international stage, the team reached the quarter-finals of the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1969–70 and 1976–77, and the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup in 1975–76. In the latter, Levski defeated Barcelona 5–4 in the second leg, becoming one of the two European teams (the other being Bayern Munich) to have scored five or more goals in one match against Barcelona in official UEFA competitions. Additionally, Levski became the only Bulgarian club to eliminate a German champion after defeating VfB Stuttgart in the first round of the 1984–85 European Cup. They also eliminated Stuttgart a year earlier in the first round of the 1983–84 UEFA Cup.The name of the team was changed to Vitosha by the authorities following the disruptions during and after the Bulgarian Cup final in 1985. The game ran on high emotions fuelled by the streak of consecutive victories of Levski over CSKA in the two years prior to the game. During the game, which CSKA won 2–1, there were confrontations both on the field and on the stands. By decree of the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party, some of the leading players of both clubs were suspended from the sport for life. The championship title of the club for 1985 was suspended. However, the suspensions were lifted shortly after. Levski won another cup and league titles in 1986 and 1988, respectively. The fourth European quarter-final came in 1986–87, when Levski knocked out the 1985–86 Danish Cup winners Boldklubben 1903 and the 1985–86 Yugoslav Cup holders Velež Mostar, before losing to the 1985–86 Copa del Rey winners Real Zaragoza.After the 1989–90 season, the club regained its original name. The team was made up of players such as Plamen Nikolov, Petar Hubchev, Tsanko Tsvetanov, Emil Kremenliev, Zlatko Yankov, Georgi Slavchev, Ilian Iliev, Daniel Borimirov, Stanimir Stoilov, Velko Yotov, Plamen Getov, Nikolay Todorov and Nasko Sirakov, and won three consecutive domestic national championships in 1993, 1994 and 1995. Levski contributed seven players (Tsvetanov, Kremenliev, Yankov, Sirakov, Nikolov, Petar Aleksandrov and Borimirov), more than any other Bulgarian team, to the Bulgaria national football team that finished in fourth place at the 1994 FIFA World Cup.In 2005–06, Levski reached the quarter-finals of the 2005–06 UEFA Cup after knocking out the 2004–05 Coupe de France winners Auxerre in the first round, finishing above SC Heerenveen, Dinamo București and the reigning title holders CSKA Moscow in the group stage, triumphing over Champions League participants Artmedia Bratislava and Udinese in the knockout stages, before being eliminated by Schalke 04.Levski, as the champions of Bulgaria, started their 2006–07 UEFA Champions League participation in the second qualiftying round, where they eliminated Georgian champions Sioni Bolnisi, defeating them 2–0 both home and away. In the third round, Levski faced Italian team Chievo Verona, which took part in the tournament because of other clubs' sanctions as part of the 2006 Serie A matchfixing scandal. Levski eliminated Chievo after a decisive 2–0 win in Sofia and a 2–2 draw in Verona, and thus became the first Bulgarian club to ever reach the group stage of the UEFA Champions League. There, they faced the title holders Barcelona, Premier League champions Chelsea, and Werder Bremen. They lost all six games and scored only one goal, in the second round against Chelsea.Levski earned a place in the 2008–09 UEFA Champions League after the Bulgarian league champions CSKA Sofia failed to obtain a UEFA license. Levski lost to BATE Borisov of Belarus in the third qualifying round.During the 2009–10 season, Levski's team started their European campaign with a 9–0 (on aggregate) win against UE Sant Julià in the second qualifying round of the 2009–10 UEFA Champions League. In the next round, Levski Sofia faced FK Baku, eliminating the team from Azerbaijan with 2–0 on aggregate. In the play-off round, Levski was eliminated by Debrecen with 4–1 on aggregate. As one of the play-off losers, Levski qualified for the 2009–10 UEFA Europa League. In the group stage, Levski faced Villarreal, Lazio and Red Bull Salzburg. Levski achieved only one win and five defeats. Levski took the win against Lazio in Italy, after Hristo Yovov scored the winning goal in the match.Levski started the 2010–11 season with a match against Dundalk, in a second qualifying round of the 2010–11 UEFA Europa League. Levski won the first match 6–0. In the return leg at Oriel Park, Levski defeated Dundalk 2–0 with two first half goals from Garra Dembélé. In the next round Levski played against Kalmar FF. The first match ended 1–1 in Sweden. In the return leg in Sofia, Levski won 5–2. In between, The Blues defeated their archrival CSKA Sofia in the Eternal derby with 1–0. Their next match in the Europa League saw them play against AIK Fotboll from Stockholm, Sweden. The first match ended in a goalless draw, and after the game, AIK hooligans attacked the Levski players and staff. The second match ended in a 2–1 home win for Levski. Goals scored by Daniel Mladenov and Garra Dembélé put Levski in the Europa League group stage. Levski was drawn in Group C, facing Gent, Lille and Sporting CP. The first match was played against Gent at home, which Levski won 3–2 with the winning goal scored by Serginho Greene. With this win, Levski recorded eight consecutive games without a defeat in European competitions. After that, Levski lost to Sporting CP with 5–0, followed by another defeat against Lille. In Sofia, Levski played well against Lille and was leading 2–1 until Ivo Ivanov scored an own goal to make it 2–2. In the last match of the Group C, Levski took a win against Sporting CP with 1–0, with the winning goal scored by Daniel Mladenov.In the following 2011–12 season, in the third qualifying round of the Europa League, Levski were eliminated by Spartak Trnava of Slovakia, following a late game 2–1 win in Sofia, and a loss of the same scoreline in Trnava. The penalty shoot-out costed Levski a place in the play-off round. This caused an upset with the fans and players, and the team barely clinched the fourth place at the winter break in the Bulgarian league. Albeit only three points from the leaders Ludogoretz Razgrad, the acting manager Georgi Ivanov was sacked from the position, but remained at the club as a sporting director. Nikolay Kostov was appointed the new manager of the club, giving the supporters a sense of optimism, which, however, faded after a cup knock-out in the hands of Lokomotiv Plovdiv and a home defeat to Minyor Pernik. Kostov handed in his resignation, leaving the managerial post once again vacant. Sporting director Georgi Ivanov once again stepped in to help the club, and accepted being the manager until the summer break, when a new one would be appointed.During the summer of 2012, former player Ilian Iliev was appointed the new manager of the club. Under his management, Levski was knocked out from the Europa League by Bosnian side FK Sarajevo. Iliev led the team to 13 league victories and to the semi-finals of the Bulgarian Cup after eliminating Cherno More Varna and Litex Lovech on the away goals rule. Iliev however was sacked after a 1–1 away draw against Pirin Gotse Delchev. Assistant manager Nikolay Mitov took over the team until the end of the season. Under his management Levski won the derby clashes against Litex, CSKA and Ludogorets but failed to win the title after a 1–1 home draw against Slavia Sofia. Levski also reached their first Bulgarian Cup final since 2007, but lost on penalties against Beroe Stara Zagora. Despite the missed opportunity of winning a trophy, Mitov's contract was renewed for the 2013–14 season. However, the team made another disappointing performance in Europa League, being eliminated by the Kazakh side Irtysh Pavlodar. As a result, Nikolay Mitov resigned as manager.In July 2013 Slaviša Jokanović was appointed as the new manager of the team. Despite losing only two matches in twelve games, Jokanović was released in October 2013. Ivaylo Petev was announced as his successor but during his introduction a few Levski supporters interrupted it, stating that they would not accept his appointment. The next day, Petev refused to take charge of the team and Antoni Zdravkov was named as the new manager. Under his reign the team suffered a heavy 3–0 loss against rivals CSKA, but managed to knock them out in the Bulgarian Cup in December 2013 after penalties. Due to the difficult financial situation, a few key players, such as Antonio Vutov and Garry Rodrigues, were sold to Udinese and Elche, respectively, during the winter break. This reflected on the team's performance and Levski finished fifth and got knocked out in the quarter-finals of the Bulgarian Cup by Botev Plovdiv. Antoni Zdravkov was sacked in March 2014, and Levski legend Elin Topuzakov took charge as a caretaker until the end of the 2013–14 season. For the first time since 1990–91 the club did not participate in European competitions.On 23 May 2014, the club supporters organized a friendly game against Lazio, marking the 100th anniversary of the club. Club icons like Georgi Ivanov, Dimitar Ivankov, Aleksandar Aleksandrov, Hristo Yovov, Elin Topuzakov and many other former players and celebrities took participation by playing in the game, as well as donating money for the event's organization. The next day, Levski marked 100 years since its founding. As of 2020, the results from a decade of incompetent management have finally come out, putting the club in a financial crisis and on the verge of bankruptcy. In the summer of 2020, club legend Nasko Sirakov took charge of the majority of shares and the club made some financial cuts, forcing a big part of the players (mainly foreigners) to leave. Levski also changed its transfer policy, signing mainly Bulgarian and homegrown players with lower salaries, allowing the club to start paying off some of the debt accumulated throughout the years. Sirakov set a target for the club to clear most of the debt by 2023, mostly through sponsorship deals, outgoing transfers, television rights and the fans' financial support.The first club crest was designed by Mincho Kachulev in 1922. Initially in the size of a square with a blue background, it was intentionally written in a stylized letter "Л" (Bulgarian letter "L"; shortened for Levski). The inner space of the letter was filled vertically equally in yellow and red colours. In a later period of time, the Cyrillic letters "С" (Sport) and "К" (club) were added at the top of the square, while the bottom side was inscribed with the name "Sofia". This badge was used by the club until 1949, when it was renamed to Dinamo.From 1949 to 1956, the emblem of the club was an irregular hexagon filled with vertical red, white, blue and yellow colours, with an inscribed handwritten Cyrillic letter "Д", alongside a five-pointed red star above it and the word "Sofia" underneath.From 1957 to 1968 the original logo of the club was restored, however the letters C" and "К" were replaced with "Ф" (Athletic) and "Д" (union).After the merger with Spartak Sofia in 1969, the club crest has been a shield in blue and white with a horizontal red bar above. The shield spawned the letters "Л" and "C", an abbreviation of the new name Levski-Spartak. The football club used this crest until 1985, when it was renamed Vitosha. Vitosha's crest was in the form of a stylized letter "C" surrounding the football in the upper curve of the letter, coloured in blue and white.In January 1990, the club restored its original name and original logo, and the letters "C" and "K" in the upper corner of the blue square were replaced with the initials "Ф" (football) and "K" (club). However, due to legal issues with the ownership of the rights to the historic crest, the club was forced to change it in 1998, when a brand new shield logo was introduced, entirely in blue. At its centre, an inscription of the letter "Л" was introduced, alongside the year of establishment – 1914. The dome of the shield was labelled "PFC Levski".After winning the legal dispute for the rights to the historic emblem in 2006, the club decided to use the two different logos simultaneously for a brief period of time. Later that year, the shield crest was completely removed and the classic square emblem has been used since."For recent transfers, see Transfers summer 2021."Up to five non-EU nationals can be registered and given a squad number for the first team in the Bulgarian First League; however, only three can be used during a match day. Those non-EU nationals with European ancestry can claim citizenship from the nation their ancestors came from. If a player does not have European ancestry he can claim Bulgarian citizenship after playing in Bulgaria for five years.Note: "For a complete list of Levski Sofia players, see ." "Players with at least one appearance for the Bulgarian national team.""Foreign players with at least 30 games for the club or that are record holders. Players who were internationally capped for their country while playing for Levski are listed in bold."EuropeSouth AmericaAfricaOfficial websitesFan websites
|
[
"Stanimir Stoilov",
"Elin Topuzakov",
"Slaviša Stojanovič",
"Georgi Todorov (football manager)"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team PFC Levski Sofia in 02/01/2015?
|
January 02, 2015
|
{
"text": [
"Stoycho Stoev"
]
}
|
L2_Q144190_P286_0
|
Georgi Todorov (football manager) is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jun, 2020 to Oct, 2020.
Elin Topuzakov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Oct, 2016 to Mar, 2017.
Stanimir Stoilov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Sep, 2021 to Dec, 2022.
Slaviša Stojanovič is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jul, 2018 to Jan, 2019.
Stoycho Stoev is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Dec, 2014 to May, 2016.
|
PFC Levski SofiaLevski Sofia () is a Bulgarian professional association football club based in Sofia, which competes in the First League, the top division of the Bulgarian football league system. The club was founded on 24 May 1914 as a football department of Levski Sofia sports club by a group of students, and is named after Vasil Levski, a Bulgarian revolutionary renowned as the national hero of the country.Levski has won a total of 73 trophies, including 26 national titles, 25 national cups and 3 supercups, as well as 13 domestic Doubles and 1 Treble. It is also the only Bulgarian football club to have never been relegated from the top division since the establishment of the league system in 1937. Levski has reached the quarter-finals of UEFA competitions for five times, was runner-up of the Balkans Cup twice, and in 2006, it became the first Bulgarian club to enter the group stage of the UEFA Champions League.The team's regular kit colour is all-blue. Levskis home ground is the Vivacom Arena - Georgi Asparuhov in Sofia, which has a capacity of 25,000 spectators. The club's biggest rivals are CSKA Sofia, and matches between the two capital sides are commonly referred to as the Eternal derby of Bulgaria. Levski is also a regular member of the European Club Association and the European Multisport Club Association.Sport Club Levski was founded in 1911 by a group of secondary school students in Sofia. The club's name was chosen in honour of the Bulgarian revolutionary Vasil Levski, and the club was officially registered on 24 May 1914.In 1914, Levski lost its first official match against FC 13 Sofia with the score 2–0. Between 1914 and 1920, football wasn't a popular sport in Bulgaria, and no additional information about the club exists. In the summer of 1921, the Sofia Sports League was established, which united ten clubs from Sofia and marked the beginning of organized football competitions in the city. Levski won the first match in the championship in the 1921–22 season, held on 18 September 1921, against Athletic Sofia with the score of 3–1. The team captured first place in the league in 1923 after a 3–2 win over bitter rivals Slavia Sofia, and successfully defended the title the following season.The first National Championship was held in 1924 with Levski representing Sofia. The team went on to win the title in 1933, 1937 and 1942, and established itself as the most popular football club in Bulgaria. In 1929, Levski became the first semi-professional football club in Bulgaria, after twelve players staged a boycott of the team in demand of financial remuneration and insurance benefits. The same year Levski met its first international opponents, losing to Gallipoli Istanbul 1–0 and winning against Kuban Istanbul 6–0. Between 1930 and 1932, Levski won the Ulpia Serdica Cup for three consecutive years and was permanently awarded the trophy as a result.After World War II, Levski became one of the two top clubs in Bulgaria. After winning the championship in 1946, 1947, 1949, 1950 and 1953, Levski would not capture the domestic title again until the mid-1960s. In 1949, the authorities changed the club's name to Dinamo following the Soviet traditions, but after the de-Stalinization of Bulgaria, it was reverted in 1957. The 1960s were marked with return to success both on the domestic and on the international stage. Levski's academy would become the most successful in national youth competitions for the years to come, and the results were first seen in the likes of Georgi Asparuhov, Georgi Sokolov, Biser Mihaylov, Kiril Ivkov, Ivan Vutsov, Stefan Aladzhov and Aleksandar Kostov, assisted by experienced veterans like Stefan Abadzhiev, Dimo Pechenikov and Hristo Iliev, which resulted in winning the championship in 1965, 1968 and 1970, including the 7–2 triumph over new bitter rivals CSKA Sofia in 1968. In the 1965–66 European Cup, Levski was eliminated in the first round by Benfica with 5–4 on aggregate.In January 1969, Levski was forcibly merged with Spartak Sofia by the Bulgarian Communist Party, and put under the auspice of the Ministry of Interior Affairs. The name of the club was once again changed, this time to Levski-Spartak.A new crop of youngsters in the likes of Kiril Milanov, Dobromir Zhechev, Pavel Panov, Yordan Yordanov, Stefan Staykov, Tomas Lafchis, Todor Barzov, Voyn Voynov, Georgi Tsvetkov, Plamen Nikolov, and Rusi Gochev not only found their place in the first team, but brought new league titles in 1974, 1977, 1979, 1984 and 1985. On the international stage, the team reached the quarter-finals of the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1969–70 and 1976–77, and the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup in 1975–76. In the latter, Levski defeated Barcelona 5–4 in the second leg, becoming one of the two European teams (the other being Bayern Munich) to have scored five or more goals in one match against Barcelona in official UEFA competitions. Additionally, Levski became the only Bulgarian club to eliminate a German champion after defeating VfB Stuttgart in the first round of the 1984–85 European Cup. They also eliminated Stuttgart a year earlier in the first round of the 1983–84 UEFA Cup.The name of the team was changed to Vitosha by the authorities following the disruptions during and after the Bulgarian Cup final in 1985. The game ran on high emotions fuelled by the streak of consecutive victories of Levski over CSKA in the two years prior to the game. During the game, which CSKA won 2–1, there were confrontations both on the field and on the stands. By decree of the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party, some of the leading players of both clubs were suspended from the sport for life. The championship title of the club for 1985 was suspended. However, the suspensions were lifted shortly after. Levski won another cup and league titles in 1986 and 1988, respectively. The fourth European quarter-final came in 1986–87, when Levski knocked out the 1985–86 Danish Cup winners Boldklubben 1903 and the 1985–86 Yugoslav Cup holders Velež Mostar, before losing to the 1985–86 Copa del Rey winners Real Zaragoza.After the 1989–90 season, the club regained its original name. The team was made up of players such as Plamen Nikolov, Petar Hubchev, Tsanko Tsvetanov, Emil Kremenliev, Zlatko Yankov, Georgi Slavchev, Ilian Iliev, Daniel Borimirov, Stanimir Stoilov, Velko Yotov, Plamen Getov, Nikolay Todorov and Nasko Sirakov, and won three consecutive domestic national championships in 1993, 1994 and 1995. Levski contributed seven players (Tsvetanov, Kremenliev, Yankov, Sirakov, Nikolov, Petar Aleksandrov and Borimirov), more than any other Bulgarian team, to the Bulgaria national football team that finished in fourth place at the 1994 FIFA World Cup.In 2005–06, Levski reached the quarter-finals of the 2005–06 UEFA Cup after knocking out the 2004–05 Coupe de France winners Auxerre in the first round, finishing above SC Heerenveen, Dinamo București and the reigning title holders CSKA Moscow in the group stage, triumphing over Champions League participants Artmedia Bratislava and Udinese in the knockout stages, before being eliminated by Schalke 04.Levski, as the champions of Bulgaria, started their 2006–07 UEFA Champions League participation in the second qualiftying round, where they eliminated Georgian champions Sioni Bolnisi, defeating them 2–0 both home and away. In the third round, Levski faced Italian team Chievo Verona, which took part in the tournament because of other clubs' sanctions as part of the 2006 Serie A matchfixing scandal. Levski eliminated Chievo after a decisive 2–0 win in Sofia and a 2–2 draw in Verona, and thus became the first Bulgarian club to ever reach the group stage of the UEFA Champions League. There, they faced the title holders Barcelona, Premier League champions Chelsea, and Werder Bremen. They lost all six games and scored only one goal, in the second round against Chelsea.Levski earned a place in the 2008–09 UEFA Champions League after the Bulgarian league champions CSKA Sofia failed to obtain a UEFA license. Levski lost to BATE Borisov of Belarus in the third qualifying round.During the 2009–10 season, Levski's team started their European campaign with a 9–0 (on aggregate) win against UE Sant Julià in the second qualifying round of the 2009–10 UEFA Champions League. In the next round, Levski Sofia faced FK Baku, eliminating the team from Azerbaijan with 2–0 on aggregate. In the play-off round, Levski was eliminated by Debrecen with 4–1 on aggregate. As one of the play-off losers, Levski qualified for the 2009–10 UEFA Europa League. In the group stage, Levski faced Villarreal, Lazio and Red Bull Salzburg. Levski achieved only one win and five defeats. Levski took the win against Lazio in Italy, after Hristo Yovov scored the winning goal in the match.Levski started the 2010–11 season with a match against Dundalk, in a second qualifying round of the 2010–11 UEFA Europa League. Levski won the first match 6–0. In the return leg at Oriel Park, Levski defeated Dundalk 2–0 with two first half goals from Garra Dembélé. In the next round Levski played against Kalmar FF. The first match ended 1–1 in Sweden. In the return leg in Sofia, Levski won 5–2. In between, The Blues defeated their archrival CSKA Sofia in the Eternal derby with 1–0. Their next match in the Europa League saw them play against AIK Fotboll from Stockholm, Sweden. The first match ended in a goalless draw, and after the game, AIK hooligans attacked the Levski players and staff. The second match ended in a 2–1 home win for Levski. Goals scored by Daniel Mladenov and Garra Dembélé put Levski in the Europa League group stage. Levski was drawn in Group C, facing Gent, Lille and Sporting CP. The first match was played against Gent at home, which Levski won 3–2 with the winning goal scored by Serginho Greene. With this win, Levski recorded eight consecutive games without a defeat in European competitions. After that, Levski lost to Sporting CP with 5–0, followed by another defeat against Lille. In Sofia, Levski played well against Lille and was leading 2–1 until Ivo Ivanov scored an own goal to make it 2–2. In the last match of the Group C, Levski took a win against Sporting CP with 1–0, with the winning goal scored by Daniel Mladenov.In the following 2011–12 season, in the third qualifying round of the Europa League, Levski were eliminated by Spartak Trnava of Slovakia, following a late game 2–1 win in Sofia, and a loss of the same scoreline in Trnava. The penalty shoot-out costed Levski a place in the play-off round. This caused an upset with the fans and players, and the team barely clinched the fourth place at the winter break in the Bulgarian league. Albeit only three points from the leaders Ludogoretz Razgrad, the acting manager Georgi Ivanov was sacked from the position, but remained at the club as a sporting director. Nikolay Kostov was appointed the new manager of the club, giving the supporters a sense of optimism, which, however, faded after a cup knock-out in the hands of Lokomotiv Plovdiv and a home defeat to Minyor Pernik. Kostov handed in his resignation, leaving the managerial post once again vacant. Sporting director Georgi Ivanov once again stepped in to help the club, and accepted being the manager until the summer break, when a new one would be appointed.During the summer of 2012, former player Ilian Iliev was appointed the new manager of the club. Under his management, Levski was knocked out from the Europa League by Bosnian side FK Sarajevo. Iliev led the team to 13 league victories and to the semi-finals of the Bulgarian Cup after eliminating Cherno More Varna and Litex Lovech on the away goals rule. Iliev however was sacked after a 1–1 away draw against Pirin Gotse Delchev. Assistant manager Nikolay Mitov took over the team until the end of the season. Under his management Levski won the derby clashes against Litex, CSKA and Ludogorets but failed to win the title after a 1–1 home draw against Slavia Sofia. Levski also reached their first Bulgarian Cup final since 2007, but lost on penalties against Beroe Stara Zagora. Despite the missed opportunity of winning a trophy, Mitov's contract was renewed for the 2013–14 season. However, the team made another disappointing performance in Europa League, being eliminated by the Kazakh side Irtysh Pavlodar. As a result, Nikolay Mitov resigned as manager.In July 2013 Slaviša Jokanović was appointed as the new manager of the team. Despite losing only two matches in twelve games, Jokanović was released in October 2013. Ivaylo Petev was announced as his successor but during his introduction a few Levski supporters interrupted it, stating that they would not accept his appointment. The next day, Petev refused to take charge of the team and Antoni Zdravkov was named as the new manager. Under his reign the team suffered a heavy 3–0 loss against rivals CSKA, but managed to knock them out in the Bulgarian Cup in December 2013 after penalties. Due to the difficult financial situation, a few key players, such as Antonio Vutov and Garry Rodrigues, were sold to Udinese and Elche, respectively, during the winter break. This reflected on the team's performance and Levski finished fifth and got knocked out in the quarter-finals of the Bulgarian Cup by Botev Plovdiv. Antoni Zdravkov was sacked in March 2014, and Levski legend Elin Topuzakov took charge as a caretaker until the end of the 2013–14 season. For the first time since 1990–91 the club did not participate in European competitions.On 23 May 2014, the club supporters organized a friendly game against Lazio, marking the 100th anniversary of the club. Club icons like Georgi Ivanov, Dimitar Ivankov, Aleksandar Aleksandrov, Hristo Yovov, Elin Topuzakov and many other former players and celebrities took participation by playing in the game, as well as donating money for the event's organization. The next day, Levski marked 100 years since its founding. As of 2020, the results from a decade of incompetent management have finally come out, putting the club in a financial crisis and on the verge of bankruptcy. In the summer of 2020, club legend Nasko Sirakov took charge of the majority of shares and the club made some financial cuts, forcing a big part of the players (mainly foreigners) to leave. Levski also changed its transfer policy, signing mainly Bulgarian and homegrown players with lower salaries, allowing the club to start paying off some of the debt accumulated throughout the years. Sirakov set a target for the club to clear most of the debt by 2023, mostly through sponsorship deals, outgoing transfers, television rights and the fans' financial support.The first club crest was designed by Mincho Kachulev in 1922. Initially in the size of a square with a blue background, it was intentionally written in a stylized letter "Л" (Bulgarian letter "L"; shortened for Levski). The inner space of the letter was filled vertically equally in yellow and red colours. In a later period of time, the Cyrillic letters "С" (Sport) and "К" (club) were added at the top of the square, while the bottom side was inscribed with the name "Sofia". This badge was used by the club until 1949, when it was renamed to Dinamo.From 1949 to 1956, the emblem of the club was an irregular hexagon filled with vertical red, white, blue and yellow colours, with an inscribed handwritten Cyrillic letter "Д", alongside a five-pointed red star above it and the word "Sofia" underneath.From 1957 to 1968 the original logo of the club was restored, however the letters C" and "К" were replaced with "Ф" (Athletic) and "Д" (union).After the merger with Spartak Sofia in 1969, the club crest has been a shield in blue and white with a horizontal red bar above. The shield spawned the letters "Л" and "C", an abbreviation of the new name Levski-Spartak. The football club used this crest until 1985, when it was renamed Vitosha. Vitosha's crest was in the form of a stylized letter "C" surrounding the football in the upper curve of the letter, coloured in blue and white.In January 1990, the club restored its original name and original logo, and the letters "C" and "K" in the upper corner of the blue square were replaced with the initials "Ф" (football) and "K" (club). However, due to legal issues with the ownership of the rights to the historic crest, the club was forced to change it in 1998, when a brand new shield logo was introduced, entirely in blue. At its centre, an inscription of the letter "Л" was introduced, alongside the year of establishment – 1914. The dome of the shield was labelled "PFC Levski".After winning the legal dispute for the rights to the historic emblem in 2006, the club decided to use the two different logos simultaneously for a brief period of time. Later that year, the shield crest was completely removed and the classic square emblem has been used since."For recent transfers, see Transfers summer 2021."Up to five non-EU nationals can be registered and given a squad number for the first team in the Bulgarian First League; however, only three can be used during a match day. Those non-EU nationals with European ancestry can claim citizenship from the nation their ancestors came from. If a player does not have European ancestry he can claim Bulgarian citizenship after playing in Bulgaria for five years.Note: "For a complete list of Levski Sofia players, see ." "Players with at least one appearance for the Bulgarian national team.""Foreign players with at least 30 games for the club or that are record holders. Players who were internationally capped for their country while playing for Levski are listed in bold."EuropeSouth AmericaAfricaOfficial websitesFan websites
|
[
"Stanimir Stoilov",
"Elin Topuzakov",
"Slaviša Stojanovič",
"Georgi Todorov (football manager)"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team PFC Levski Sofia in Jan 02, 2015?
|
January 02, 2015
|
{
"text": [
"Stoycho Stoev"
]
}
|
L2_Q144190_P286_0
|
Georgi Todorov (football manager) is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jun, 2020 to Oct, 2020.
Elin Topuzakov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Oct, 2016 to Mar, 2017.
Stanimir Stoilov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Sep, 2021 to Dec, 2022.
Slaviša Stojanovič is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jul, 2018 to Jan, 2019.
Stoycho Stoev is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Dec, 2014 to May, 2016.
|
PFC Levski SofiaLevski Sofia () is a Bulgarian professional association football club based in Sofia, which competes in the First League, the top division of the Bulgarian football league system. The club was founded on 24 May 1914 as a football department of Levski Sofia sports club by a group of students, and is named after Vasil Levski, a Bulgarian revolutionary renowned as the national hero of the country.Levski has won a total of 73 trophies, including 26 national titles, 25 national cups and 3 supercups, as well as 13 domestic Doubles and 1 Treble. It is also the only Bulgarian football club to have never been relegated from the top division since the establishment of the league system in 1937. Levski has reached the quarter-finals of UEFA competitions for five times, was runner-up of the Balkans Cup twice, and in 2006, it became the first Bulgarian club to enter the group stage of the UEFA Champions League.The team's regular kit colour is all-blue. Levskis home ground is the Vivacom Arena - Georgi Asparuhov in Sofia, which has a capacity of 25,000 spectators. The club's biggest rivals are CSKA Sofia, and matches between the two capital sides are commonly referred to as the Eternal derby of Bulgaria. Levski is also a regular member of the European Club Association and the European Multisport Club Association.Sport Club Levski was founded in 1911 by a group of secondary school students in Sofia. The club's name was chosen in honour of the Bulgarian revolutionary Vasil Levski, and the club was officially registered on 24 May 1914.In 1914, Levski lost its first official match against FC 13 Sofia with the score 2–0. Between 1914 and 1920, football wasn't a popular sport in Bulgaria, and no additional information about the club exists. In the summer of 1921, the Sofia Sports League was established, which united ten clubs from Sofia and marked the beginning of organized football competitions in the city. Levski won the first match in the championship in the 1921–22 season, held on 18 September 1921, against Athletic Sofia with the score of 3–1. The team captured first place in the league in 1923 after a 3–2 win over bitter rivals Slavia Sofia, and successfully defended the title the following season.The first National Championship was held in 1924 with Levski representing Sofia. The team went on to win the title in 1933, 1937 and 1942, and established itself as the most popular football club in Bulgaria. In 1929, Levski became the first semi-professional football club in Bulgaria, after twelve players staged a boycott of the team in demand of financial remuneration and insurance benefits. The same year Levski met its first international opponents, losing to Gallipoli Istanbul 1–0 and winning against Kuban Istanbul 6–0. Between 1930 and 1932, Levski won the Ulpia Serdica Cup for three consecutive years and was permanently awarded the trophy as a result.After World War II, Levski became one of the two top clubs in Bulgaria. After winning the championship in 1946, 1947, 1949, 1950 and 1953, Levski would not capture the domestic title again until the mid-1960s. In 1949, the authorities changed the club's name to Dinamo following the Soviet traditions, but after the de-Stalinization of Bulgaria, it was reverted in 1957. The 1960s were marked with return to success both on the domestic and on the international stage. Levski's academy would become the most successful in national youth competitions for the years to come, and the results were first seen in the likes of Georgi Asparuhov, Georgi Sokolov, Biser Mihaylov, Kiril Ivkov, Ivan Vutsov, Stefan Aladzhov and Aleksandar Kostov, assisted by experienced veterans like Stefan Abadzhiev, Dimo Pechenikov and Hristo Iliev, which resulted in winning the championship in 1965, 1968 and 1970, including the 7–2 triumph over new bitter rivals CSKA Sofia in 1968. In the 1965–66 European Cup, Levski was eliminated in the first round by Benfica with 5–4 on aggregate.In January 1969, Levski was forcibly merged with Spartak Sofia by the Bulgarian Communist Party, and put under the auspice of the Ministry of Interior Affairs. The name of the club was once again changed, this time to Levski-Spartak.A new crop of youngsters in the likes of Kiril Milanov, Dobromir Zhechev, Pavel Panov, Yordan Yordanov, Stefan Staykov, Tomas Lafchis, Todor Barzov, Voyn Voynov, Georgi Tsvetkov, Plamen Nikolov, and Rusi Gochev not only found their place in the first team, but brought new league titles in 1974, 1977, 1979, 1984 and 1985. On the international stage, the team reached the quarter-finals of the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1969–70 and 1976–77, and the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup in 1975–76. In the latter, Levski defeated Barcelona 5–4 in the second leg, becoming one of the two European teams (the other being Bayern Munich) to have scored five or more goals in one match against Barcelona in official UEFA competitions. Additionally, Levski became the only Bulgarian club to eliminate a German champion after defeating VfB Stuttgart in the first round of the 1984–85 European Cup. They also eliminated Stuttgart a year earlier in the first round of the 1983–84 UEFA Cup.The name of the team was changed to Vitosha by the authorities following the disruptions during and after the Bulgarian Cup final in 1985. The game ran on high emotions fuelled by the streak of consecutive victories of Levski over CSKA in the two years prior to the game. During the game, which CSKA won 2–1, there were confrontations both on the field and on the stands. By decree of the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party, some of the leading players of both clubs were suspended from the sport for life. The championship title of the club for 1985 was suspended. However, the suspensions were lifted shortly after. Levski won another cup and league titles in 1986 and 1988, respectively. The fourth European quarter-final came in 1986–87, when Levski knocked out the 1985–86 Danish Cup winners Boldklubben 1903 and the 1985–86 Yugoslav Cup holders Velež Mostar, before losing to the 1985–86 Copa del Rey winners Real Zaragoza.After the 1989–90 season, the club regained its original name. The team was made up of players such as Plamen Nikolov, Petar Hubchev, Tsanko Tsvetanov, Emil Kremenliev, Zlatko Yankov, Georgi Slavchev, Ilian Iliev, Daniel Borimirov, Stanimir Stoilov, Velko Yotov, Plamen Getov, Nikolay Todorov and Nasko Sirakov, and won three consecutive domestic national championships in 1993, 1994 and 1995. Levski contributed seven players (Tsvetanov, Kremenliev, Yankov, Sirakov, Nikolov, Petar Aleksandrov and Borimirov), more than any other Bulgarian team, to the Bulgaria national football team that finished in fourth place at the 1994 FIFA World Cup.In 2005–06, Levski reached the quarter-finals of the 2005–06 UEFA Cup after knocking out the 2004–05 Coupe de France winners Auxerre in the first round, finishing above SC Heerenveen, Dinamo București and the reigning title holders CSKA Moscow in the group stage, triumphing over Champions League participants Artmedia Bratislava and Udinese in the knockout stages, before being eliminated by Schalke 04.Levski, as the champions of Bulgaria, started their 2006–07 UEFA Champions League participation in the second qualiftying round, where they eliminated Georgian champions Sioni Bolnisi, defeating them 2–0 both home and away. In the third round, Levski faced Italian team Chievo Verona, which took part in the tournament because of other clubs' sanctions as part of the 2006 Serie A matchfixing scandal. Levski eliminated Chievo after a decisive 2–0 win in Sofia and a 2–2 draw in Verona, and thus became the first Bulgarian club to ever reach the group stage of the UEFA Champions League. There, they faced the title holders Barcelona, Premier League champions Chelsea, and Werder Bremen. They lost all six games and scored only one goal, in the second round against Chelsea.Levski earned a place in the 2008–09 UEFA Champions League after the Bulgarian league champions CSKA Sofia failed to obtain a UEFA license. Levski lost to BATE Borisov of Belarus in the third qualifying round.During the 2009–10 season, Levski's team started their European campaign with a 9–0 (on aggregate) win against UE Sant Julià in the second qualifying round of the 2009–10 UEFA Champions League. In the next round, Levski Sofia faced FK Baku, eliminating the team from Azerbaijan with 2–0 on aggregate. In the play-off round, Levski was eliminated by Debrecen with 4–1 on aggregate. As one of the play-off losers, Levski qualified for the 2009–10 UEFA Europa League. In the group stage, Levski faced Villarreal, Lazio and Red Bull Salzburg. Levski achieved only one win and five defeats. Levski took the win against Lazio in Italy, after Hristo Yovov scored the winning goal in the match.Levski started the 2010–11 season with a match against Dundalk, in a second qualifying round of the 2010–11 UEFA Europa League. Levski won the first match 6–0. In the return leg at Oriel Park, Levski defeated Dundalk 2–0 with two first half goals from Garra Dembélé. In the next round Levski played against Kalmar FF. The first match ended 1–1 in Sweden. In the return leg in Sofia, Levski won 5–2. In between, The Blues defeated their archrival CSKA Sofia in the Eternal derby with 1–0. Their next match in the Europa League saw them play against AIK Fotboll from Stockholm, Sweden. The first match ended in a goalless draw, and after the game, AIK hooligans attacked the Levski players and staff. The second match ended in a 2–1 home win for Levski. Goals scored by Daniel Mladenov and Garra Dembélé put Levski in the Europa League group stage. Levski was drawn in Group C, facing Gent, Lille and Sporting CP. The first match was played against Gent at home, which Levski won 3–2 with the winning goal scored by Serginho Greene. With this win, Levski recorded eight consecutive games without a defeat in European competitions. After that, Levski lost to Sporting CP with 5–0, followed by another defeat against Lille. In Sofia, Levski played well against Lille and was leading 2–1 until Ivo Ivanov scored an own goal to make it 2–2. In the last match of the Group C, Levski took a win against Sporting CP with 1–0, with the winning goal scored by Daniel Mladenov.In the following 2011–12 season, in the third qualifying round of the Europa League, Levski were eliminated by Spartak Trnava of Slovakia, following a late game 2–1 win in Sofia, and a loss of the same scoreline in Trnava. The penalty shoot-out costed Levski a place in the play-off round. This caused an upset with the fans and players, and the team barely clinched the fourth place at the winter break in the Bulgarian league. Albeit only three points from the leaders Ludogoretz Razgrad, the acting manager Georgi Ivanov was sacked from the position, but remained at the club as a sporting director. Nikolay Kostov was appointed the new manager of the club, giving the supporters a sense of optimism, which, however, faded after a cup knock-out in the hands of Lokomotiv Plovdiv and a home defeat to Minyor Pernik. Kostov handed in his resignation, leaving the managerial post once again vacant. Sporting director Georgi Ivanov once again stepped in to help the club, and accepted being the manager until the summer break, when a new one would be appointed.During the summer of 2012, former player Ilian Iliev was appointed the new manager of the club. Under his management, Levski was knocked out from the Europa League by Bosnian side FK Sarajevo. Iliev led the team to 13 league victories and to the semi-finals of the Bulgarian Cup after eliminating Cherno More Varna and Litex Lovech on the away goals rule. Iliev however was sacked after a 1–1 away draw against Pirin Gotse Delchev. Assistant manager Nikolay Mitov took over the team until the end of the season. Under his management Levski won the derby clashes against Litex, CSKA and Ludogorets but failed to win the title after a 1–1 home draw against Slavia Sofia. Levski also reached their first Bulgarian Cup final since 2007, but lost on penalties against Beroe Stara Zagora. Despite the missed opportunity of winning a trophy, Mitov's contract was renewed for the 2013–14 season. However, the team made another disappointing performance in Europa League, being eliminated by the Kazakh side Irtysh Pavlodar. As a result, Nikolay Mitov resigned as manager.In July 2013 Slaviša Jokanović was appointed as the new manager of the team. Despite losing only two matches in twelve games, Jokanović was released in October 2013. Ivaylo Petev was announced as his successor but during his introduction a few Levski supporters interrupted it, stating that they would not accept his appointment. The next day, Petev refused to take charge of the team and Antoni Zdravkov was named as the new manager. Under his reign the team suffered a heavy 3–0 loss against rivals CSKA, but managed to knock them out in the Bulgarian Cup in December 2013 after penalties. Due to the difficult financial situation, a few key players, such as Antonio Vutov and Garry Rodrigues, were sold to Udinese and Elche, respectively, during the winter break. This reflected on the team's performance and Levski finished fifth and got knocked out in the quarter-finals of the Bulgarian Cup by Botev Plovdiv. Antoni Zdravkov was sacked in March 2014, and Levski legend Elin Topuzakov took charge as a caretaker until the end of the 2013–14 season. For the first time since 1990–91 the club did not participate in European competitions.On 23 May 2014, the club supporters organized a friendly game against Lazio, marking the 100th anniversary of the club. Club icons like Georgi Ivanov, Dimitar Ivankov, Aleksandar Aleksandrov, Hristo Yovov, Elin Topuzakov and many other former players and celebrities took participation by playing in the game, as well as donating money for the event's organization. The next day, Levski marked 100 years since its founding. As of 2020, the results from a decade of incompetent management have finally come out, putting the club in a financial crisis and on the verge of bankruptcy. In the summer of 2020, club legend Nasko Sirakov took charge of the majority of shares and the club made some financial cuts, forcing a big part of the players (mainly foreigners) to leave. Levski also changed its transfer policy, signing mainly Bulgarian and homegrown players with lower salaries, allowing the club to start paying off some of the debt accumulated throughout the years. Sirakov set a target for the club to clear most of the debt by 2023, mostly through sponsorship deals, outgoing transfers, television rights and the fans' financial support.The first club crest was designed by Mincho Kachulev in 1922. Initially in the size of a square with a blue background, it was intentionally written in a stylized letter "Л" (Bulgarian letter "L"; shortened for Levski). The inner space of the letter was filled vertically equally in yellow and red colours. In a later period of time, the Cyrillic letters "С" (Sport) and "К" (club) were added at the top of the square, while the bottom side was inscribed with the name "Sofia". This badge was used by the club until 1949, when it was renamed to Dinamo.From 1949 to 1956, the emblem of the club was an irregular hexagon filled with vertical red, white, blue and yellow colours, with an inscribed handwritten Cyrillic letter "Д", alongside a five-pointed red star above it and the word "Sofia" underneath.From 1957 to 1968 the original logo of the club was restored, however the letters C" and "К" were replaced with "Ф" (Athletic) and "Д" (union).After the merger with Spartak Sofia in 1969, the club crest has been a shield in blue and white with a horizontal red bar above. The shield spawned the letters "Л" and "C", an abbreviation of the new name Levski-Spartak. The football club used this crest until 1985, when it was renamed Vitosha. Vitosha's crest was in the form of a stylized letter "C" surrounding the football in the upper curve of the letter, coloured in blue and white.In January 1990, the club restored its original name and original logo, and the letters "C" and "K" in the upper corner of the blue square were replaced with the initials "Ф" (football) and "K" (club). However, due to legal issues with the ownership of the rights to the historic crest, the club was forced to change it in 1998, when a brand new shield logo was introduced, entirely in blue. At its centre, an inscription of the letter "Л" was introduced, alongside the year of establishment – 1914. The dome of the shield was labelled "PFC Levski".After winning the legal dispute for the rights to the historic emblem in 2006, the club decided to use the two different logos simultaneously for a brief period of time. Later that year, the shield crest was completely removed and the classic square emblem has been used since."For recent transfers, see Transfers summer 2021."Up to five non-EU nationals can be registered and given a squad number for the first team in the Bulgarian First League; however, only three can be used during a match day. Those non-EU nationals with European ancestry can claim citizenship from the nation their ancestors came from. If a player does not have European ancestry he can claim Bulgarian citizenship after playing in Bulgaria for five years.Note: "For a complete list of Levski Sofia players, see ." "Players with at least one appearance for the Bulgarian national team.""Foreign players with at least 30 games for the club or that are record holders. Players who were internationally capped for their country while playing for Levski are listed in bold."EuropeSouth AmericaAfricaOfficial websitesFan websites
|
[
"Stanimir Stoilov",
"Elin Topuzakov",
"Slaviša Stojanovič",
"Georgi Todorov (football manager)"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team PFC Levski Sofia in 01/02/2015?
|
January 02, 2015
|
{
"text": [
"Stoycho Stoev"
]
}
|
L2_Q144190_P286_0
|
Georgi Todorov (football manager) is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jun, 2020 to Oct, 2020.
Elin Topuzakov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Oct, 2016 to Mar, 2017.
Stanimir Stoilov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Sep, 2021 to Dec, 2022.
Slaviša Stojanovič is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jul, 2018 to Jan, 2019.
Stoycho Stoev is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Dec, 2014 to May, 2016.
|
PFC Levski SofiaLevski Sofia () is a Bulgarian professional association football club based in Sofia, which competes in the First League, the top division of the Bulgarian football league system. The club was founded on 24 May 1914 as a football department of Levski Sofia sports club by a group of students, and is named after Vasil Levski, a Bulgarian revolutionary renowned as the national hero of the country.Levski has won a total of 73 trophies, including 26 national titles, 25 national cups and 3 supercups, as well as 13 domestic Doubles and 1 Treble. It is also the only Bulgarian football club to have never been relegated from the top division since the establishment of the league system in 1937. Levski has reached the quarter-finals of UEFA competitions for five times, was runner-up of the Balkans Cup twice, and in 2006, it became the first Bulgarian club to enter the group stage of the UEFA Champions League.The team's regular kit colour is all-blue. Levskis home ground is the Vivacom Arena - Georgi Asparuhov in Sofia, which has a capacity of 25,000 spectators. The club's biggest rivals are CSKA Sofia, and matches between the two capital sides are commonly referred to as the Eternal derby of Bulgaria. Levski is also a regular member of the European Club Association and the European Multisport Club Association.Sport Club Levski was founded in 1911 by a group of secondary school students in Sofia. The club's name was chosen in honour of the Bulgarian revolutionary Vasil Levski, and the club was officially registered on 24 May 1914.In 1914, Levski lost its first official match against FC 13 Sofia with the score 2–0. Between 1914 and 1920, football wasn't a popular sport in Bulgaria, and no additional information about the club exists. In the summer of 1921, the Sofia Sports League was established, which united ten clubs from Sofia and marked the beginning of organized football competitions in the city. Levski won the first match in the championship in the 1921–22 season, held on 18 September 1921, against Athletic Sofia with the score of 3–1. The team captured first place in the league in 1923 after a 3–2 win over bitter rivals Slavia Sofia, and successfully defended the title the following season.The first National Championship was held in 1924 with Levski representing Sofia. The team went on to win the title in 1933, 1937 and 1942, and established itself as the most popular football club in Bulgaria. In 1929, Levski became the first semi-professional football club in Bulgaria, after twelve players staged a boycott of the team in demand of financial remuneration and insurance benefits. The same year Levski met its first international opponents, losing to Gallipoli Istanbul 1–0 and winning against Kuban Istanbul 6–0. Between 1930 and 1932, Levski won the Ulpia Serdica Cup for three consecutive years and was permanently awarded the trophy as a result.After World War II, Levski became one of the two top clubs in Bulgaria. After winning the championship in 1946, 1947, 1949, 1950 and 1953, Levski would not capture the domestic title again until the mid-1960s. In 1949, the authorities changed the club's name to Dinamo following the Soviet traditions, but after the de-Stalinization of Bulgaria, it was reverted in 1957. The 1960s were marked with return to success both on the domestic and on the international stage. Levski's academy would become the most successful in national youth competitions for the years to come, and the results were first seen in the likes of Georgi Asparuhov, Georgi Sokolov, Biser Mihaylov, Kiril Ivkov, Ivan Vutsov, Stefan Aladzhov and Aleksandar Kostov, assisted by experienced veterans like Stefan Abadzhiev, Dimo Pechenikov and Hristo Iliev, which resulted in winning the championship in 1965, 1968 and 1970, including the 7–2 triumph over new bitter rivals CSKA Sofia in 1968. In the 1965–66 European Cup, Levski was eliminated in the first round by Benfica with 5–4 on aggregate.In January 1969, Levski was forcibly merged with Spartak Sofia by the Bulgarian Communist Party, and put under the auspice of the Ministry of Interior Affairs. The name of the club was once again changed, this time to Levski-Spartak.A new crop of youngsters in the likes of Kiril Milanov, Dobromir Zhechev, Pavel Panov, Yordan Yordanov, Stefan Staykov, Tomas Lafchis, Todor Barzov, Voyn Voynov, Georgi Tsvetkov, Plamen Nikolov, and Rusi Gochev not only found their place in the first team, but brought new league titles in 1974, 1977, 1979, 1984 and 1985. On the international stage, the team reached the quarter-finals of the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1969–70 and 1976–77, and the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup in 1975–76. In the latter, Levski defeated Barcelona 5–4 in the second leg, becoming one of the two European teams (the other being Bayern Munich) to have scored five or more goals in one match against Barcelona in official UEFA competitions. Additionally, Levski became the only Bulgarian club to eliminate a German champion after defeating VfB Stuttgart in the first round of the 1984–85 European Cup. They also eliminated Stuttgart a year earlier in the first round of the 1983–84 UEFA Cup.The name of the team was changed to Vitosha by the authorities following the disruptions during and after the Bulgarian Cup final in 1985. The game ran on high emotions fuelled by the streak of consecutive victories of Levski over CSKA in the two years prior to the game. During the game, which CSKA won 2–1, there were confrontations both on the field and on the stands. By decree of the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party, some of the leading players of both clubs were suspended from the sport for life. The championship title of the club for 1985 was suspended. However, the suspensions were lifted shortly after. Levski won another cup and league titles in 1986 and 1988, respectively. The fourth European quarter-final came in 1986–87, when Levski knocked out the 1985–86 Danish Cup winners Boldklubben 1903 and the 1985–86 Yugoslav Cup holders Velež Mostar, before losing to the 1985–86 Copa del Rey winners Real Zaragoza.After the 1989–90 season, the club regained its original name. The team was made up of players such as Plamen Nikolov, Petar Hubchev, Tsanko Tsvetanov, Emil Kremenliev, Zlatko Yankov, Georgi Slavchev, Ilian Iliev, Daniel Borimirov, Stanimir Stoilov, Velko Yotov, Plamen Getov, Nikolay Todorov and Nasko Sirakov, and won three consecutive domestic national championships in 1993, 1994 and 1995. Levski contributed seven players (Tsvetanov, Kremenliev, Yankov, Sirakov, Nikolov, Petar Aleksandrov and Borimirov), more than any other Bulgarian team, to the Bulgaria national football team that finished in fourth place at the 1994 FIFA World Cup.In 2005–06, Levski reached the quarter-finals of the 2005–06 UEFA Cup after knocking out the 2004–05 Coupe de France winners Auxerre in the first round, finishing above SC Heerenveen, Dinamo București and the reigning title holders CSKA Moscow in the group stage, triumphing over Champions League participants Artmedia Bratislava and Udinese in the knockout stages, before being eliminated by Schalke 04.Levski, as the champions of Bulgaria, started their 2006–07 UEFA Champions League participation in the second qualiftying round, where they eliminated Georgian champions Sioni Bolnisi, defeating them 2–0 both home and away. In the third round, Levski faced Italian team Chievo Verona, which took part in the tournament because of other clubs' sanctions as part of the 2006 Serie A matchfixing scandal. Levski eliminated Chievo after a decisive 2–0 win in Sofia and a 2–2 draw in Verona, and thus became the first Bulgarian club to ever reach the group stage of the UEFA Champions League. There, they faced the title holders Barcelona, Premier League champions Chelsea, and Werder Bremen. They lost all six games and scored only one goal, in the second round against Chelsea.Levski earned a place in the 2008–09 UEFA Champions League after the Bulgarian league champions CSKA Sofia failed to obtain a UEFA license. Levski lost to BATE Borisov of Belarus in the third qualifying round.During the 2009–10 season, Levski's team started their European campaign with a 9–0 (on aggregate) win against UE Sant Julià in the second qualifying round of the 2009–10 UEFA Champions League. In the next round, Levski Sofia faced FK Baku, eliminating the team from Azerbaijan with 2–0 on aggregate. In the play-off round, Levski was eliminated by Debrecen with 4–1 on aggregate. As one of the play-off losers, Levski qualified for the 2009–10 UEFA Europa League. In the group stage, Levski faced Villarreal, Lazio and Red Bull Salzburg. Levski achieved only one win and five defeats. Levski took the win against Lazio in Italy, after Hristo Yovov scored the winning goal in the match.Levski started the 2010–11 season with a match against Dundalk, in a second qualifying round of the 2010–11 UEFA Europa League. Levski won the first match 6–0. In the return leg at Oriel Park, Levski defeated Dundalk 2–0 with two first half goals from Garra Dembélé. In the next round Levski played against Kalmar FF. The first match ended 1–1 in Sweden. In the return leg in Sofia, Levski won 5–2. In between, The Blues defeated their archrival CSKA Sofia in the Eternal derby with 1–0. Their next match in the Europa League saw them play against AIK Fotboll from Stockholm, Sweden. The first match ended in a goalless draw, and after the game, AIK hooligans attacked the Levski players and staff. The second match ended in a 2–1 home win for Levski. Goals scored by Daniel Mladenov and Garra Dembélé put Levski in the Europa League group stage. Levski was drawn in Group C, facing Gent, Lille and Sporting CP. The first match was played against Gent at home, which Levski won 3–2 with the winning goal scored by Serginho Greene. With this win, Levski recorded eight consecutive games without a defeat in European competitions. After that, Levski lost to Sporting CP with 5–0, followed by another defeat against Lille. In Sofia, Levski played well against Lille and was leading 2–1 until Ivo Ivanov scored an own goal to make it 2–2. In the last match of the Group C, Levski took a win against Sporting CP with 1–0, with the winning goal scored by Daniel Mladenov.In the following 2011–12 season, in the third qualifying round of the Europa League, Levski were eliminated by Spartak Trnava of Slovakia, following a late game 2–1 win in Sofia, and a loss of the same scoreline in Trnava. The penalty shoot-out costed Levski a place in the play-off round. This caused an upset with the fans and players, and the team barely clinched the fourth place at the winter break in the Bulgarian league. Albeit only three points from the leaders Ludogoretz Razgrad, the acting manager Georgi Ivanov was sacked from the position, but remained at the club as a sporting director. Nikolay Kostov was appointed the new manager of the club, giving the supporters a sense of optimism, which, however, faded after a cup knock-out in the hands of Lokomotiv Plovdiv and a home defeat to Minyor Pernik. Kostov handed in his resignation, leaving the managerial post once again vacant. Sporting director Georgi Ivanov once again stepped in to help the club, and accepted being the manager until the summer break, when a new one would be appointed.During the summer of 2012, former player Ilian Iliev was appointed the new manager of the club. Under his management, Levski was knocked out from the Europa League by Bosnian side FK Sarajevo. Iliev led the team to 13 league victories and to the semi-finals of the Bulgarian Cup after eliminating Cherno More Varna and Litex Lovech on the away goals rule. Iliev however was sacked after a 1–1 away draw against Pirin Gotse Delchev. Assistant manager Nikolay Mitov took over the team until the end of the season. Under his management Levski won the derby clashes against Litex, CSKA and Ludogorets but failed to win the title after a 1–1 home draw against Slavia Sofia. Levski also reached their first Bulgarian Cup final since 2007, but lost on penalties against Beroe Stara Zagora. Despite the missed opportunity of winning a trophy, Mitov's contract was renewed for the 2013–14 season. However, the team made another disappointing performance in Europa League, being eliminated by the Kazakh side Irtysh Pavlodar. As a result, Nikolay Mitov resigned as manager.In July 2013 Slaviša Jokanović was appointed as the new manager of the team. Despite losing only two matches in twelve games, Jokanović was released in October 2013. Ivaylo Petev was announced as his successor but during his introduction a few Levski supporters interrupted it, stating that they would not accept his appointment. The next day, Petev refused to take charge of the team and Antoni Zdravkov was named as the new manager. Under his reign the team suffered a heavy 3–0 loss against rivals CSKA, but managed to knock them out in the Bulgarian Cup in December 2013 after penalties. Due to the difficult financial situation, a few key players, such as Antonio Vutov and Garry Rodrigues, were sold to Udinese and Elche, respectively, during the winter break. This reflected on the team's performance and Levski finished fifth and got knocked out in the quarter-finals of the Bulgarian Cup by Botev Plovdiv. Antoni Zdravkov was sacked in March 2014, and Levski legend Elin Topuzakov took charge as a caretaker until the end of the 2013–14 season. For the first time since 1990–91 the club did not participate in European competitions.On 23 May 2014, the club supporters organized a friendly game against Lazio, marking the 100th anniversary of the club. Club icons like Georgi Ivanov, Dimitar Ivankov, Aleksandar Aleksandrov, Hristo Yovov, Elin Topuzakov and many other former players and celebrities took participation by playing in the game, as well as donating money for the event's organization. The next day, Levski marked 100 years since its founding. As of 2020, the results from a decade of incompetent management have finally come out, putting the club in a financial crisis and on the verge of bankruptcy. In the summer of 2020, club legend Nasko Sirakov took charge of the majority of shares and the club made some financial cuts, forcing a big part of the players (mainly foreigners) to leave. Levski also changed its transfer policy, signing mainly Bulgarian and homegrown players with lower salaries, allowing the club to start paying off some of the debt accumulated throughout the years. Sirakov set a target for the club to clear most of the debt by 2023, mostly through sponsorship deals, outgoing transfers, television rights and the fans' financial support.The first club crest was designed by Mincho Kachulev in 1922. Initially in the size of a square with a blue background, it was intentionally written in a stylized letter "Л" (Bulgarian letter "L"; shortened for Levski). The inner space of the letter was filled vertically equally in yellow and red colours. In a later period of time, the Cyrillic letters "С" (Sport) and "К" (club) were added at the top of the square, while the bottom side was inscribed with the name "Sofia". This badge was used by the club until 1949, when it was renamed to Dinamo.From 1949 to 1956, the emblem of the club was an irregular hexagon filled with vertical red, white, blue and yellow colours, with an inscribed handwritten Cyrillic letter "Д", alongside a five-pointed red star above it and the word "Sofia" underneath.From 1957 to 1968 the original logo of the club was restored, however the letters C" and "К" were replaced with "Ф" (Athletic) and "Д" (union).After the merger with Spartak Sofia in 1969, the club crest has been a shield in blue and white with a horizontal red bar above. The shield spawned the letters "Л" and "C", an abbreviation of the new name Levski-Spartak. The football club used this crest until 1985, when it was renamed Vitosha. Vitosha's crest was in the form of a stylized letter "C" surrounding the football in the upper curve of the letter, coloured in blue and white.In January 1990, the club restored its original name and original logo, and the letters "C" and "K" in the upper corner of the blue square were replaced with the initials "Ф" (football) and "K" (club). However, due to legal issues with the ownership of the rights to the historic crest, the club was forced to change it in 1998, when a brand new shield logo was introduced, entirely in blue. At its centre, an inscription of the letter "Л" was introduced, alongside the year of establishment – 1914. The dome of the shield was labelled "PFC Levski".After winning the legal dispute for the rights to the historic emblem in 2006, the club decided to use the two different logos simultaneously for a brief period of time. Later that year, the shield crest was completely removed and the classic square emblem has been used since."For recent transfers, see Transfers summer 2021."Up to five non-EU nationals can be registered and given a squad number for the first team in the Bulgarian First League; however, only three can be used during a match day. Those non-EU nationals with European ancestry can claim citizenship from the nation their ancestors came from. If a player does not have European ancestry he can claim Bulgarian citizenship after playing in Bulgaria for five years.Note: "For a complete list of Levski Sofia players, see ." "Players with at least one appearance for the Bulgarian national team.""Foreign players with at least 30 games for the club or that are record holders. Players who were internationally capped for their country while playing for Levski are listed in bold."EuropeSouth AmericaAfricaOfficial websitesFan websites
|
[
"Stanimir Stoilov",
"Elin Topuzakov",
"Slaviša Stojanovič",
"Georgi Todorov (football manager)"
] |
|
Who was the head coach of the team PFC Levski Sofia in 02-Jan-201502-January-2015?
|
January 02, 2015
|
{
"text": [
"Stoycho Stoev"
]
}
|
L2_Q144190_P286_0
|
Georgi Todorov (football manager) is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jun, 2020 to Oct, 2020.
Elin Topuzakov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Oct, 2016 to Mar, 2017.
Stanimir Stoilov is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Sep, 2021 to Dec, 2022.
Slaviša Stojanovič is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Jul, 2018 to Jan, 2019.
Stoycho Stoev is the head coach of PFC Levski Sofia from Dec, 2014 to May, 2016.
|
PFC Levski SofiaLevski Sofia () is a Bulgarian professional association football club based in Sofia, which competes in the First League, the top division of the Bulgarian football league system. The club was founded on 24 May 1914 as a football department of Levski Sofia sports club by a group of students, and is named after Vasil Levski, a Bulgarian revolutionary renowned as the national hero of the country.Levski has won a total of 73 trophies, including 26 national titles, 25 national cups and 3 supercups, as well as 13 domestic Doubles and 1 Treble. It is also the only Bulgarian football club to have never been relegated from the top division since the establishment of the league system in 1937. Levski has reached the quarter-finals of UEFA competitions for five times, was runner-up of the Balkans Cup twice, and in 2006, it became the first Bulgarian club to enter the group stage of the UEFA Champions League.The team's regular kit colour is all-blue. Levskis home ground is the Vivacom Arena - Georgi Asparuhov in Sofia, which has a capacity of 25,000 spectators. The club's biggest rivals are CSKA Sofia, and matches between the two capital sides are commonly referred to as the Eternal derby of Bulgaria. Levski is also a regular member of the European Club Association and the European Multisport Club Association.Sport Club Levski was founded in 1911 by a group of secondary school students in Sofia. The club's name was chosen in honour of the Bulgarian revolutionary Vasil Levski, and the club was officially registered on 24 May 1914.In 1914, Levski lost its first official match against FC 13 Sofia with the score 2–0. Between 1914 and 1920, football wasn't a popular sport in Bulgaria, and no additional information about the club exists. In the summer of 1921, the Sofia Sports League was established, which united ten clubs from Sofia and marked the beginning of organized football competitions in the city. Levski won the first match in the championship in the 1921–22 season, held on 18 September 1921, against Athletic Sofia with the score of 3–1. The team captured first place in the league in 1923 after a 3–2 win over bitter rivals Slavia Sofia, and successfully defended the title the following season.The first National Championship was held in 1924 with Levski representing Sofia. The team went on to win the title in 1933, 1937 and 1942, and established itself as the most popular football club in Bulgaria. In 1929, Levski became the first semi-professional football club in Bulgaria, after twelve players staged a boycott of the team in demand of financial remuneration and insurance benefits. The same year Levski met its first international opponents, losing to Gallipoli Istanbul 1–0 and winning against Kuban Istanbul 6–0. Between 1930 and 1932, Levski won the Ulpia Serdica Cup for three consecutive years and was permanently awarded the trophy as a result.After World War II, Levski became one of the two top clubs in Bulgaria. After winning the championship in 1946, 1947, 1949, 1950 and 1953, Levski would not capture the domestic title again until the mid-1960s. In 1949, the authorities changed the club's name to Dinamo following the Soviet traditions, but after the de-Stalinization of Bulgaria, it was reverted in 1957. The 1960s were marked with return to success both on the domestic and on the international stage. Levski's academy would become the most successful in national youth competitions for the years to come, and the results were first seen in the likes of Georgi Asparuhov, Georgi Sokolov, Biser Mihaylov, Kiril Ivkov, Ivan Vutsov, Stefan Aladzhov and Aleksandar Kostov, assisted by experienced veterans like Stefan Abadzhiev, Dimo Pechenikov and Hristo Iliev, which resulted in winning the championship in 1965, 1968 and 1970, including the 7–2 triumph over new bitter rivals CSKA Sofia in 1968. In the 1965–66 European Cup, Levski was eliminated in the first round by Benfica with 5–4 on aggregate.In January 1969, Levski was forcibly merged with Spartak Sofia by the Bulgarian Communist Party, and put under the auspice of the Ministry of Interior Affairs. The name of the club was once again changed, this time to Levski-Spartak.A new crop of youngsters in the likes of Kiril Milanov, Dobromir Zhechev, Pavel Panov, Yordan Yordanov, Stefan Staykov, Tomas Lafchis, Todor Barzov, Voyn Voynov, Georgi Tsvetkov, Plamen Nikolov, and Rusi Gochev not only found their place in the first team, but brought new league titles in 1974, 1977, 1979, 1984 and 1985. On the international stage, the team reached the quarter-finals of the European Cup Winners' Cup in 1969–70 and 1976–77, and the quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup in 1975–76. In the latter, Levski defeated Barcelona 5–4 in the second leg, becoming one of the two European teams (the other being Bayern Munich) to have scored five or more goals in one match against Barcelona in official UEFA competitions. Additionally, Levski became the only Bulgarian club to eliminate a German champion after defeating VfB Stuttgart in the first round of the 1984–85 European Cup. They also eliminated Stuttgart a year earlier in the first round of the 1983–84 UEFA Cup.The name of the team was changed to Vitosha by the authorities following the disruptions during and after the Bulgarian Cup final in 1985. The game ran on high emotions fuelled by the streak of consecutive victories of Levski over CSKA in the two years prior to the game. During the game, which CSKA won 2–1, there were confrontations both on the field and on the stands. By decree of the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party, some of the leading players of both clubs were suspended from the sport for life. The championship title of the club for 1985 was suspended. However, the suspensions were lifted shortly after. Levski won another cup and league titles in 1986 and 1988, respectively. The fourth European quarter-final came in 1986–87, when Levski knocked out the 1985–86 Danish Cup winners Boldklubben 1903 and the 1985–86 Yugoslav Cup holders Velež Mostar, before losing to the 1985–86 Copa del Rey winners Real Zaragoza.After the 1989–90 season, the club regained its original name. The team was made up of players such as Plamen Nikolov, Petar Hubchev, Tsanko Tsvetanov, Emil Kremenliev, Zlatko Yankov, Georgi Slavchev, Ilian Iliev, Daniel Borimirov, Stanimir Stoilov, Velko Yotov, Plamen Getov, Nikolay Todorov and Nasko Sirakov, and won three consecutive domestic national championships in 1993, 1994 and 1995. Levski contributed seven players (Tsvetanov, Kremenliev, Yankov, Sirakov, Nikolov, Petar Aleksandrov and Borimirov), more than any other Bulgarian team, to the Bulgaria national football team that finished in fourth place at the 1994 FIFA World Cup.In 2005–06, Levski reached the quarter-finals of the 2005–06 UEFA Cup after knocking out the 2004–05 Coupe de France winners Auxerre in the first round, finishing above SC Heerenveen, Dinamo București and the reigning title holders CSKA Moscow in the group stage, triumphing over Champions League participants Artmedia Bratislava and Udinese in the knockout stages, before being eliminated by Schalke 04.Levski, as the champions of Bulgaria, started their 2006–07 UEFA Champions League participation in the second qualiftying round, where they eliminated Georgian champions Sioni Bolnisi, defeating them 2–0 both home and away. In the third round, Levski faced Italian team Chievo Verona, which took part in the tournament because of other clubs' sanctions as part of the 2006 Serie A matchfixing scandal. Levski eliminated Chievo after a decisive 2–0 win in Sofia and a 2–2 draw in Verona, and thus became the first Bulgarian club to ever reach the group stage of the UEFA Champions League. There, they faced the title holders Barcelona, Premier League champions Chelsea, and Werder Bremen. They lost all six games and scored only one goal, in the second round against Chelsea.Levski earned a place in the 2008–09 UEFA Champions League after the Bulgarian league champions CSKA Sofia failed to obtain a UEFA license. Levski lost to BATE Borisov of Belarus in the third qualifying round.During the 2009–10 season, Levski's team started their European campaign with a 9–0 (on aggregate) win against UE Sant Julià in the second qualifying round of the 2009–10 UEFA Champions League. In the next round, Levski Sofia faced FK Baku, eliminating the team from Azerbaijan with 2–0 on aggregate. In the play-off round, Levski was eliminated by Debrecen with 4–1 on aggregate. As one of the play-off losers, Levski qualified for the 2009–10 UEFA Europa League. In the group stage, Levski faced Villarreal, Lazio and Red Bull Salzburg. Levski achieved only one win and five defeats. Levski took the win against Lazio in Italy, after Hristo Yovov scored the winning goal in the match.Levski started the 2010–11 season with a match against Dundalk, in a second qualifying round of the 2010–11 UEFA Europa League. Levski won the first match 6–0. In the return leg at Oriel Park, Levski defeated Dundalk 2–0 with two first half goals from Garra Dembélé. In the next round Levski played against Kalmar FF. The first match ended 1–1 in Sweden. In the return leg in Sofia, Levski won 5–2. In between, The Blues defeated their archrival CSKA Sofia in the Eternal derby with 1–0. Their next match in the Europa League saw them play against AIK Fotboll from Stockholm, Sweden. The first match ended in a goalless draw, and after the game, AIK hooligans attacked the Levski players and staff. The second match ended in a 2–1 home win for Levski. Goals scored by Daniel Mladenov and Garra Dembélé put Levski in the Europa League group stage. Levski was drawn in Group C, facing Gent, Lille and Sporting CP. The first match was played against Gent at home, which Levski won 3–2 with the winning goal scored by Serginho Greene. With this win, Levski recorded eight consecutive games without a defeat in European competitions. After that, Levski lost to Sporting CP with 5–0, followed by another defeat against Lille. In Sofia, Levski played well against Lille and was leading 2–1 until Ivo Ivanov scored an own goal to make it 2–2. In the last match of the Group C, Levski took a win against Sporting CP with 1–0, with the winning goal scored by Daniel Mladenov.In the following 2011–12 season, in the third qualifying round of the Europa League, Levski were eliminated by Spartak Trnava of Slovakia, following a late game 2–1 win in Sofia, and a loss of the same scoreline in Trnava. The penalty shoot-out costed Levski a place in the play-off round. This caused an upset with the fans and players, and the team barely clinched the fourth place at the winter break in the Bulgarian league. Albeit only three points from the leaders Ludogoretz Razgrad, the acting manager Georgi Ivanov was sacked from the position, but remained at the club as a sporting director. Nikolay Kostov was appointed the new manager of the club, giving the supporters a sense of optimism, which, however, faded after a cup knock-out in the hands of Lokomotiv Plovdiv and a home defeat to Minyor Pernik. Kostov handed in his resignation, leaving the managerial post once again vacant. Sporting director Georgi Ivanov once again stepped in to help the club, and accepted being the manager until the summer break, when a new one would be appointed.During the summer of 2012, former player Ilian Iliev was appointed the new manager of the club. Under his management, Levski was knocked out from the Europa League by Bosnian side FK Sarajevo. Iliev led the team to 13 league victories and to the semi-finals of the Bulgarian Cup after eliminating Cherno More Varna and Litex Lovech on the away goals rule. Iliev however was sacked after a 1–1 away draw against Pirin Gotse Delchev. Assistant manager Nikolay Mitov took over the team until the end of the season. Under his management Levski won the derby clashes against Litex, CSKA and Ludogorets but failed to win the title after a 1–1 home draw against Slavia Sofia. Levski also reached their first Bulgarian Cup final since 2007, but lost on penalties against Beroe Stara Zagora. Despite the missed opportunity of winning a trophy, Mitov's contract was renewed for the 2013–14 season. However, the team made another disappointing performance in Europa League, being eliminated by the Kazakh side Irtysh Pavlodar. As a result, Nikolay Mitov resigned as manager.In July 2013 Slaviša Jokanović was appointed as the new manager of the team. Despite losing only two matches in twelve games, Jokanović was released in October 2013. Ivaylo Petev was announced as his successor but during his introduction a few Levski supporters interrupted it, stating that they would not accept his appointment. The next day, Petev refused to take charge of the team and Antoni Zdravkov was named as the new manager. Under his reign the team suffered a heavy 3–0 loss against rivals CSKA, but managed to knock them out in the Bulgarian Cup in December 2013 after penalties. Due to the difficult financial situation, a few key players, such as Antonio Vutov and Garry Rodrigues, were sold to Udinese and Elche, respectively, during the winter break. This reflected on the team's performance and Levski finished fifth and got knocked out in the quarter-finals of the Bulgarian Cup by Botev Plovdiv. Antoni Zdravkov was sacked in March 2014, and Levski legend Elin Topuzakov took charge as a caretaker until the end of the 2013–14 season. For the first time since 1990–91 the club did not participate in European competitions.On 23 May 2014, the club supporters organized a friendly game against Lazio, marking the 100th anniversary of the club. Club icons like Georgi Ivanov, Dimitar Ivankov, Aleksandar Aleksandrov, Hristo Yovov, Elin Topuzakov and many other former players and celebrities took participation by playing in the game, as well as donating money for the event's organization. The next day, Levski marked 100 years since its founding. As of 2020, the results from a decade of incompetent management have finally come out, putting the club in a financial crisis and on the verge of bankruptcy. In the summer of 2020, club legend Nasko Sirakov took charge of the majority of shares and the club made some financial cuts, forcing a big part of the players (mainly foreigners) to leave. Levski also changed its transfer policy, signing mainly Bulgarian and homegrown players with lower salaries, allowing the club to start paying off some of the debt accumulated throughout the years. Sirakov set a target for the club to clear most of the debt by 2023, mostly through sponsorship deals, outgoing transfers, television rights and the fans' financial support.The first club crest was designed by Mincho Kachulev in 1922. Initially in the size of a square with a blue background, it was intentionally written in a stylized letter "Л" (Bulgarian letter "L"; shortened for Levski). The inner space of the letter was filled vertically equally in yellow and red colours. In a later period of time, the Cyrillic letters "С" (Sport) and "К" (club) were added at the top of the square, while the bottom side was inscribed with the name "Sofia". This badge was used by the club until 1949, when it was renamed to Dinamo.From 1949 to 1956, the emblem of the club was an irregular hexagon filled with vertical red, white, blue and yellow colours, with an inscribed handwritten Cyrillic letter "Д", alongside a five-pointed red star above it and the word "Sofia" underneath.From 1957 to 1968 the original logo of the club was restored, however the letters C" and "К" were replaced with "Ф" (Athletic) and "Д" (union).After the merger with Spartak Sofia in 1969, the club crest has been a shield in blue and white with a horizontal red bar above. The shield spawned the letters "Л" and "C", an abbreviation of the new name Levski-Spartak. The football club used this crest until 1985, when it was renamed Vitosha. Vitosha's crest was in the form of a stylized letter "C" surrounding the football in the upper curve of the letter, coloured in blue and white.In January 1990, the club restored its original name and original logo, and the letters "C" and "K" in the upper corner of the blue square were replaced with the initials "Ф" (football) and "K" (club). However, due to legal issues with the ownership of the rights to the historic crest, the club was forced to change it in 1998, when a brand new shield logo was introduced, entirely in blue. At its centre, an inscription of the letter "Л" was introduced, alongside the year of establishment – 1914. The dome of the shield was labelled "PFC Levski".After winning the legal dispute for the rights to the historic emblem in 2006, the club decided to use the two different logos simultaneously for a brief period of time. Later that year, the shield crest was completely removed and the classic square emblem has been used since."For recent transfers, see Transfers summer 2021."Up to five non-EU nationals can be registered and given a squad number for the first team in the Bulgarian First League; however, only three can be used during a match day. Those non-EU nationals with European ancestry can claim citizenship from the nation their ancestors came from. If a player does not have European ancestry he can claim Bulgarian citizenship after playing in Bulgaria for five years.Note: "For a complete list of Levski Sofia players, see ." "Players with at least one appearance for the Bulgarian national team.""Foreign players with at least 30 games for the club or that are record holders. Players who were internationally capped for their country while playing for Levski are listed in bold."EuropeSouth AmericaAfricaOfficial websitesFan websites
|
[
"Stanimir Stoilov",
"Elin Topuzakov",
"Slaviša Stojanovič",
"Georgi Todorov (football manager)"
] |
|
Who was the head of Australia in Nov, 1937?
|
November 05, 1937
|
{
"text": [
"Joseph Lyons"
]
}
|
L2_Q408_P6_9
|
Arthur Fadden is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1941 to Oct, 1941.
James Scullin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1929 to Jan, 1932.
Edmund Barton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1901 to Sep, 1903.
Tony Abbott is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2013 to Sep, 2015.
Joseph Lyons is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1932 to Apr, 1939.
John McEwen is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1967 to Jan, 1968.
Alfred Deakin is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1905 to Nov, 1908.
Julia Gillard is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 2010 to Jun, 2013.
Chris Watson is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1904 to Aug, 1904.
Andrew Fisher is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1908 to Jun, 1909.
Scott Morrison is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 2018 to May, 2022.
John Gorton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1968 to Mar, 1971.
Robert Menzies is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1949 to Jan, 1966.
Frank Forde is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Jul, 1945.
Ben Chifley is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Dec, 1949.
Malcolm Turnbull is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2015 to Aug, 2018.
Bob Hawke is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1983 to Dec, 1991.
Billy Hughes is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1915 to Feb, 1923.
Joseph Cook is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 1913 to Sep, 1914.
John Howard is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1996 to Mar, 2007.
John Curtin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1941 to Jul, 1945.
Harold Holt is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1966 to Dec, 1967.
Malcolm Fraser is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1975 to Mar, 1983.
Anthony Albanese is the head of the government of Australia from May, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
Kevin Rudd is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 2007 to Jun, 2010.
George Reid is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1904 to Jul, 1905.
Stanley Bruce is the head of the government of Australia from Feb, 1923 to Oct, 1929.
Paul Keating is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1991 to Mar, 1996.
Gough Whitlam is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1972 to Nov, 1975.
William McMahon is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1971 to Dec, 1972.
Earle Page is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1939 to Apr, 1939.
|
AustraliaAustralia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia's population of nearly / 1000000 round 0 million, in an area of , is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Canberra is the nation's capital, while the largest city is Sydney, and other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide.Indigenous Australians inhabited the continent for about 65,000 years, prior to the first arrival of Dutch explorers in the early 17th century, who named it New Holland. In 1770, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain and initially settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788, a date which became Australia's national day. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the time of an 1850s gold rush, most of the continent had been explored by European settlers and an additional five self-governing crown colonies established. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy, comprising six states and ten territories.Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, and mountain ranges in the south-east. Australia generates its income from various sources, including mining-related exports, telecommunications, banking, manufacturing, and international education.Australia is a highly developed country, with the world's twelfth-largest economy. It has a high-income economy, with the world's tenth-highest per capita income. Australia is a regional power, and has the world's thirteenth-highest military expenditure. Immigrants account for 30% of the country's population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. Having the eight-highest Human Development Index, and the ninth-highest ranked democracy globally as of 2020, Australia ranks highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom, civil liberties, and political rights, with all its major cities faring exceptionally in global comparative livability surveys. It is a member of the United Nations, the G20, the Commonwealth of Nations, the ANZUS, the OECD, the WTO, the APEC, the Pacific Islands Forum, the Pacific Community and the ASEAN + 6 mechanism.The name "Australia" (pronounced in Australian English) is derived from the Latin "Terra Australis" ("southern land"), a name used for a hypothetical continent in the Southern Hemisphere since ancient times. When Europeans first began visiting and mapping Australia in the 17th century, the name "Terra Australis" was naturally applied to the new territories.Until the early 19th century, Australia was best known as "New Holland", a name first applied by the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in 1644 (as "Nieuw-Holland") and subsequently anglicised. "Terra Australis" still saw occasional usage, such as in scientific texts. The name "Australia" was popularised by the explorer Matthew Flinders, who said it was "more agreeable to the ear, and an assimilation to the names of the other great portions of the Earth". Several famous early cartographers also made use of the word Australia on maps. Gerardus Mercator used the phrase "climata " on his double cordiform map of the world of 1538, as did Gemma Frisius, who was Mercator's teacher and collaborator, on his own cordiform wall map in 1540. Australia appears in a book on astronomy by Cyriaco Jacob zum Barth published in Frankfurt am Main in 1545.The first time that "Australia" appears to have been officially used was in April 1817, when Governor Lachlan Macquarie acknowledged the receipt of Flinders' charts of Australia from Lord Bathurst. In December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted. In 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially by that name. The first official published use of the new name came with the publication in 1830 of "The Australia Directory" by the Hydrographic Office.Colloquial names for Australia include "Oz" and "the Land Down Under" (usually shortened to just "Down Under"). Other epithets include "the Great Southern Land", "the Lucky Country", "the Sunburnt Country", and "the Wide Brown Land". The latter two both derive from Dorothea Mackellar's 1908 poem "My Country".Human habitation of the Australian continent is known to have begun at least 65,000 years ago, with the migration of people by land bridges and short sea-crossings from what is now Southeast Asia. The Madjedbebe rock shelter in Arnhem Land is recognised as the oldest site showing the presence of humans in Australia. The oldest human remains found are the Lake Mungo remains, which have been dated to around 41,000 years ago. These people were the ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. Aboriginal Australian culture is one of the oldest continual cultures on Earth.At the time of first European contact, most Indigenous Australians were hunter-gatherers with complex economies and societies. Recent archaeological finds suggest that a population of 750,000 could have been sustained. Indigenous Australians have an oral culture with spiritual values based on reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, obtained their livelihood from seasonal horticulture and the resources of their reefs and seas. The northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by Makassan fishermen from what is now Indonesia.The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the "Duyfken" captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, and made landfall on 26 February 1606 at the Pennefather River near the modern town of Weipa on Cape York. Later that year, Spanish explorer Luís Vaz de Torres sailed through, and navigated, Torres Strait islands. The Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent "New Holland" during the 17th century, and although no attempt at settlement was made, a number of shipwrecks left men either stranded or, as in the case of the "Batavia" in 1629, marooned for mutiny and murder, thus becoming the first Europeans to permanently inhabit the continent. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688 (while serving as a crewman under pirate Captain John Read) and again in 1699 on a return trip. In 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain.With the loss of its American colonies in 1783, the British Government sent a fleet of ships, the "First Fleet", under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip, to establish a new penal colony in New South Wales. A camp was set up and the Union flag raised at Sydney Cove, Port Jackson, on 26 January 1788, a date which later became Australia's national day, Australia Day. Most early convicts were transported for petty crimes and assigned as labourers or servants upon arrival. While the majority settled into colonial society once emancipated, convict rebellions and uprisings were also staged, but invariably suppressed under martial law. The 1808 Rum Rebellion, the only successful armed takeover of government in Australia, instigated a two-year period of military rule.The indigenous population declined for 150 years following settlement, mainly due to infectious disease. Thousands more died as a result of frontier conflict with settlers. A government policy of "assimilation" beginning with the "Aboriginal Protection Act 1869" resulted in the removal of many Aboriginal children from their families and communities—referred to as the Stolen Generations — a practice which also contributed to the decline in the indigenous population. As a result of the 1967 referendum, the Federal government's power to enact special laws with respect to a particular race was extended to enable the making of laws with respect to Aboriginals. Traditional ownership of land ("native title") was not recognised in law until 1992, when the High Court of Australia held in "Mabo v Queensland (No 2)" that the legal doctrine that Australia had been "terra nullius" ("land belonging to no one") did not apply to Australia at the time of British settlement.The expansion of British control over other areas of the continent began in the early 19th century, initially confined to coastal regions. A settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land (present-day Tasmania) in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. In 1813, Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Wentworth crossed the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, opening the interior to European settlement. The British claim was extended to the whole Australian continent in 1827 when Major Edmund Lockyer established a settlement on King George Sound (modern-day Albany). The Swan River Colony (present-day Perth) was established in 1829, evolving into the largest Australian colony by area, Western Australia. In accordance with population growth, separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales: South Australia in 1836, New Zealand in 1841, Victoria in 1851, and Queensland in 1859. The Northern Territory was excised from South Australia in 1911. South Australia was founded as a "free province" — it was never a penal colony. Western Australia was also founded "free" but later accepted transported convicts, the last of which arrived in 1868, decades after transportation had ceased to the other colonies. In the mid-19th century, explorers such as Burke and Wills went further inland to determine its agricultural potential and answer scientific questions.A series of gold rushes beginning in the early 1850s led to an influx of new migrants from China, North America and continental Europe, and also spurred outbreaks of bushranging and civil unrest; the latter peaked in 1854 when Ballarat miners launched the Eureka Rebellion against gold license fees. Between 1855 and 1890, the six colonies individually gained responsible government, managing most of their own affairs while remaining part of the British Empire. The Colonial Office in London retained control of some matters, notably foreign affairs and defence.On 1 January 1901, federation of the colonies was achieved after a decade of planning, consultation and voting. After the 1907 Imperial Conference, Australia and the other self-governing British colonies were given the status of "dominion" within the British Empire. The Federal Capital Territory (later renamed the Australian Capital Territory) was formed in 1911 as the location for the future federal capital of Canberra. Melbourne was the temporary seat of government from 1901 to 1927 while Canberra was being constructed. The Northern Territory was transferred from the control of the South Australian government to the federal parliament in 1911. Australia became the colonial ruler of the Territory of Papua (which had initially been annexed by Queensland in 1883) in 1902 and of the Territory of New Guinea (formerly German New Guinea) in 1920. The two were unified as the Territory of Papua and New Guinea in 1949 and gained independence from Australia in 1975.In 1914, Australia joined Britain in fighting World War I, with support from both the outgoing Commonwealth Liberal Party and the incoming Australian Labor Party. Australians took part in many of the major battles fought on the Western Front. Of about 416,000 who served, about 60,000 were killed and another 152,000 were wounded. Many Australians regard the defeat of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs) at Gallipoli as the birth of the nation — its first major military action. The Kokoda Track campaign is regarded by many as an analogous nation-defining event during World War II.Britain's Statute of Westminster 1931 formally ended most of the constitutional links between Australia and the United Kingdom. Australia adopted it in 1942, but it was backdated to 1939 to confirm the validity of legislation passed by the Australian Parliament during World War II. The shock of Britain's defeat in Asia in 1942, followed soon after by the bombing of Darwin and other Japanese attacks, led to a widespread belief in Australia that an invasion was imminent, and a shift towards the United States as a new ally and protector. Since 1951, Australia has been a formal military ally of the United States, under the ANZUS treaty.After World War II, Australia encouraged immigration from mainland Europe. Since the 1970s and following the abolition of the White Australia policy, immigration from Asia and elsewhere was also promoted. As a result, Australia's demography, culture, and self-image were transformed. The "Australia Act 1986" severed the remaining constitutional ties between Australia and the United Kingdom. In a 1999 referendum, 55% of voters and a majority in every state rejected a proposal to become a republic with a president appointed by a two-thirds vote in both Houses of the Australian Parliament. There has been an increasing focus in foreign policy on ties with other Pacific Rim nations while maintaining close ties with Australia's traditional allies and trading partners.Surrounded by the Indian and Pacific oceans, Australia is separated from Asia by the Arafura and Timor seas, with the Coral Sea lying off the Queensland coast, and the Tasman Sea lying between Australia and New Zealand. The world's smallest continent and sixth largest country by total area, Australia—owing to its size and isolation—is often dubbed the "island continent" and is sometimes considered the world's largest island. Australia has of coastline (excluding all offshore islands), and claims an extensive Exclusive Economic Zone of . This exclusive economic zone does not include the Australian Antarctic Territory.Mainland Australia lies between latitudes 9° and 44° South, and longitudes 112° and 154° East. Australia's size gives it a wide variety of landscapes, with tropical rainforests in the north-east, mountain ranges in the south-east, south-west and east, and desert in the centre. The desert or semi-arid land commonly known as the outback makes up by far the largest portion of land. Australia is the driest inhabited continent; its annual rainfall averaged over continental area is less than 500 mm. The population density is 3.2 inhabitants per square kilometre, although a large proportion of the population lives along the temperate south-eastern coastline.The Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest coral reef, lies a short distance off the north-east coast and extends for over . Mount Augustus, claimed to be the world's largest monolith, is located in Western Australia. At , Mount Kosciuszko is the highest mountain on the Australian mainland. Even taller are Mawson Peak (at ), on the remote Australian external territory of Heard Island, and, in the Australian Antarctic Territory, Mount McClintock and Mount Menzies, at and respectively.Eastern Australia is marked by the Great Dividing Range, which runs parallel to the coast of Queensland, New South Wales and much of Victoria. The name is not strictly accurate, because parts of the range consist of low hills, and the highlands are typically no more than in height. The coastal uplands and a belt of Brigalow grasslands lie between the coast and the mountains, while inland of the dividing range are large areas of grassland and shrubland. These include the western plains of New South Wales, and the Mitchell Grass Downs and Mulga Lands of inland Queensland. The northernmost point of the mainland is the tropical Cape York Peninsula.The landscapes of the Top End and the Gulf Country—with their tropical climate—include forest, woodland, wetland, grassland, rainforest and desert. At the north-west corner of the continent are the sandstone cliffs and gorges of The Kimberley, and below that the Pilbara. The Victoria Plains tropical savanna lies south of the Kimberly and Arnhem Land savannas, forming a transition between the coastal savannas and the interior deserts. At the heart of the country are the uplands of central Australia. Prominent features of the centre and south include Uluru (also known as Ayers Rock), the famous sandstone monolith, and the inland Simpson, Tirari and Sturt Stony, Gibson, Great Sandy, Tanami, and Great Victoria deserts, with the famous Nullarbor Plain on the southern coast. The Western Australian mulga shrublands lie between the interior deserts and Mediterranean-climate Southwest Australia.Lying on the Indo-Australian Plate, the mainland of Australia is the lowest and most primordial landmass on Earth with a relatively stable geological history. The landmass includes virtually all known rock types and from all geological time periods spanning over 3.8 billion years of the Earth's history. The Pilbara Craton is one of only two pristine Archaean 3.6–2.7 Ga (billion years ago) crusts identified on the Earth.Having been part of all major supercontinents, the Australian continent began to form after the breakup of Gondwana in the Permian, with the separation of the continental landmass from the African continent and Indian subcontinent. It separated from Antarctica over a prolonged period beginning in the Permian and continuing through to the Cretaceous. When the last glacial period ended in about 10,000 BC, rising sea levels formed Bass Strait, separating Tasmania from the mainland. Then between about 8,000 and 6,500 BC, the lowlands in the north were flooded by the sea, separating New Guinea, the Aru Islands, and the mainland of Australia. The Australian continent is moving toward Eurasia at the rate of 6 to 7 centimetres a year.The Australian mainland's continental crust, excluding the thinned margins, has an average thickness of 38km, with a range in thickness from 24 km to 59 km. Australia's geology can be divided into several main sections, showcasing that the continent grew from west to east: the Archaean cratonic shields found mostly in the west, Proterozoic fold belts in the centre and Phanerozoic sedimentary basins, metamorphic and igneous rocks in the east.The Australian mainland and Tasmania are situated in the middle of the tectonic plate and have no active volcanoes, but due to passing over the East Australia hotspot, recent volcanism has occurred during the Holocene, in the Newer Volcanics Province of western Victoria and southeastern South Australia. Volcanism also occurs in the island of New Guinea (considered geologically as part of the Australian continent), and in the Australian external territory of Heard Island and McDonald Islands. Seismic activity in the Australian mainland and Tasmania is also low, with the greatest number of fatalities having occurred in the 1989 Newcastle earthquake.The climate of Australia is significantly influenced by ocean currents, including the Indian Ocean Dipole and the El Niño–Southern Oscillation, which is correlated with periodic drought, and the seasonal tropical low-pressure system that produces cyclones in northern Australia. These factors cause rainfall to vary markedly from year to year. Much of the northern part of the country has a tropical, predominantly summer-rainfall (monsoon). The south-west corner of the country has a Mediterranean climate. The south-east ranges from oceanic (Tasmania and coastal Victoria) to humid subtropical (upper half of New South Wales), with the highlands featuring alpine and subpolar oceanic climates. The interior is arid to semi-arid.Driven by climate change, average temperatures have risen more than 1°C since 1960. Associated changes in rainfall patterns and climate extremes exacerbate existing issues such as drought and bushfires. 2019 was Australia's warmest recorded year, and the 2019–2020 bushfire season was the country's worst on record. Australia's greenhouse gas emissions per capita are among the highest in the world.Water restrictions are frequently in place in many regions and cities of Australia in response to chronic shortages due to urban population increases and localised drought. Throughout much of the continent, major flooding regularly follows extended periods of drought, flushing out inland river systems, overflowing dams and inundating large inland flood plains, as occurred throughout Eastern Australia in the early 2010s after the 2000s Australian drought.Although most of Australia is semi-arid or desert, the continent includes a diverse range of habitats from alpine heaths to tropical rainforests. Fungi typify that diversity—an estimated 250,000 species—of which only 5% have been described—occur in Australia. Because of the continent's great age, extremely variable weather patterns, and long-term geographic isolation, much of Australia's biota is unique. About 85% of flowering plants, 84% of mammals, more than 45% of birds, and 89% of in-shore, temperate-zone fish are endemic. Australia has at least 755 species of reptile, more than any other country in the world. Besides Antarctica, Australia is the only continent that developed without feline species. Feral cats may have been introduced in the 17th century by Dutch shipwrecks, and later in the 18th century by European settlers. They are now considered a major factor in the decline and extinction of many vulnerable and endangered native species. Australia is also one of 17 megadiverse countries.Australian forests are mostly made up of evergreen species, particularly eucalyptus trees in the less arid regions; wattles replace them as the dominant species in drier regions and deserts. Among well-known Australian animals are the monotremes (the platypus and echidna); a host of marsupials, including the kangaroo, koala, and wombat, and birds such as the emu and the kookaburra. Australia is home to many dangerous animals including some of the most venomous snakes in the world. The dingo was introduced by Austronesian people who traded with Indigenous Australians around 3000 BCE. Many animal and plant species became extinct soon after first human settlement, including the Australian megafauna; others have disappeared since European settlement, among them the thylacine.Many of Australia's ecoregions, and the species within those regions, are threatened by human activities and introduced animal, chromistan, fungal and plant species. All these factors have led to Australia's having the highest mammal extinction rate of any country in the world. The federal "Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999" is the legal framework for the protection of threatened species. Numerous protected areas have been created under the National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia's Biological Diversity to protect and preserve unique ecosystems; 65 wetlands are listed under the Ramsar Convention, and 16 natural World Heritage Sites have been established. Australia was ranked 21st out of 178 countries in the world on the 2018 Environmental Performance Index. There are more than 1,800 animals and plants on Australia's threatened species list, including more than 500 animals.Australia is a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy. The country has maintained a stable liberal democratic political system under its constitution, which is one of the world's oldest, since Federation in 1901. It is also one of the world's oldest federations, in which power is divided between the federal and state and territorial governments. The Australian system of government combines elements derived from the political systems of the United Kingdom (a fused executive, constitutional monarchy and strong party discipline) and the United States (federalism, a written constitution and strong bicameralism with an elected upper house), along with distinctive indigenous features.The federal government is separated into three branches:Elizabeth II reigns as Queen of Australia and is represented in Australia by the governor-general at the federal level and by the governors at the state level, who by convention act on the advice of her ministers. Thus, in practice the governor-general acts as a legal figurehead for the actions of the prime minister and the Federal Executive Council. The governor-general does have extraordinary reserve powers which may be exercised outside the prime minister's request in rare and limited circumstances, the most notable exercise of which was the dismissal of the Whitlam Government in the constitutional crisis of 1975.In the Senate (the upper house), there are 76 senators: twelve each from the states and two each from the mainland territories (the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory). The House of Representatives (the lower house) has 151 members elected from single-member electoral divisions, commonly known as "electorates" or "seats", allocated to states on the basis of population, with each original state guaranteed a minimum of five seats. Elections for both chambers are normally held every three years simultaneously; senators have overlapping six-year terms except for those from the territories, whose terms are not fixed but are tied to the electoral cycle for the lower house; thus only 40 of the 76 places in the Senate are put to each election unless the cycle is interrupted by a double dissolution.Australia's electoral system uses preferential voting for all lower house elections with the exception of Tasmania and the ACT which, along with the Senate and most state upper houses, combine it with proportional representation in a system known as the single transferable vote. Voting is compulsory for all enrolled citizens 18 years and over in every jurisdiction, as is enrolment. The party with majority support in the House of Representatives forms the government and its leader becomes Prime Minister. In cases where no party has majority support, the Governor-General has the constitutional power to appoint the Prime Minister and, if necessary, dismiss one that has lost the confidence of Parliament. Due to the relatively unique position of Australia operating as a Westminster Parliamentary democracy with an elected upper house, the system has sometimes been referred to as having a "Washminster mutation", or as a Semi-parliamentary system. There are two major political groups that usually form government, federally and in the states: the Australian Labor Party and the Coalition which is a formal grouping of the Liberal Party and its minor partner, the National Party. Within Australian political culture, the Coalition is considered centre-right and the Labor Party is considered centre-left. Independent members and several minor parties have achieved representation in Australian parliaments, mostly in upper houses. The Australian Greens are often considered the "third force" in politics, being the third largest party by both vote and membership.The most recent federal election was held on 18 May 2019 and resulted in the Coalition, led by Prime Minister Scott Morrison, retaining government.Australia has six states — New South Wales (NSW), Queensland (QLD), South Australia (SA), Tasmania (TAS), Victoria (VIC) and Western Australia (WA) — and two major mainland territories—the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and the Northern Territory (NT). In most respects, these two territories function as states, except that the Commonwealth Parliament has the power to modify or repeal any legislation passed by the territory parliaments.Under the constitution, the states essentially have plenary legislative power to legislate on any subject, whereas the Commonwealth (federal) Parliament may legislate only within the subject areas enumerated under section 51. For example, state parliaments have the power to legislate with respect to education, criminal law and state police, health, transport, and local government, but the Commonwealth Parliament does not have any specific power to legislate in these areas. However, Commonwealth laws prevail over state laws to the extent of the inconsistency.Each state and major mainland territory has its own parliament — unicameral in the Northern Territory, the ACT and Queensland, and bicameral in the other states. The states are sovereign entities, although subject to certain powers of the Commonwealth as defined by the Constitution. The lower houses are known as the Legislative Assembly (the House of Assembly in South Australia and Tasmania); the upper houses are known as the Legislative Council. The head of the government in each state is the Premier and in each territory the Chief Minister. The Queen is represented in each state by a governor; and in the Northern Territory, the administrator. In the Commonwealth, the Queen's representative is the governor-general.The Commonwealth Parliament also directly administers the external territories of Ashmore and Cartier Islands, Christmas Island, the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, the Coral Sea Islands, Heard Island and McDonald Islands, and the claimed region of Australian Antarctic Territory, as well as the internal Jervis Bay Territory, a naval base and sea port for the national capital in land that was formerly part of New South Wales. The external territory of Norfolk Island previously exercised considerable autonomy under the "Norfolk Island Act 1979" through its own legislative assembly and an Administrator to represent the Queen. In 2015, the Commonwealth Parliament abolished self-government, integrating Norfolk Island into the Australian tax and welfare systems and replacing its legislative assembly with a council. Macquarie Island is part of Tasmania, and Lord Howe Island of New South Wales.Over recent decades, Australia's foreign relations have been driven by a close association with the United States through the ANZUS pact, and by a desire to develop relationships with Asia and the Pacific, particularly through Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Pacific Islands Forum and the Pacific Community, of which Australia is a founding member. In 2005, Australia secured an inaugural seat at the East Asia Summit following its accession to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, and in 2011 attended the Sixth East Asia Summit in Indonesia. Australia is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, in which the Commonwealth Heads of Government meetings provide the main forum for co-operation. Australia has pursued the cause of international trade liberalisation. It led the formation of the Cairns Group and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.Australia is a member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), and has pursued several major bilateral free trade agreements, most recently the Australia–United States Free Trade Agreement and Closer Economic Relations with New Zealand, with another free trade agreement being negotiated with China — the Australia–China Free Trade Agreement — and Japan, South Korea in 2011, Australia–Chile Free Trade Agreement, and has put the Trans-Pacific Partnership before parliament for ratification.Australia maintains a deeply integrated relationship with neighbouring New Zealand, with free mobility of citizens between the two countries under the Trans-Tasman Travel Arrangement and free trade under the Australia–New Zealand Closer Economic Relations Trade Agreement. New Zealand, Canada and the United Kingdom are the most favourably viewed countries in the world by Australian people.Along with New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Malaysia and Singapore, Australia is party to the Five Power Defence Arrangements, a regional defence agreement. A founding member country of the United Nations, Australia is strongly committed to multilateralism and maintains an international aid program under which some 60 countries receive assistance. The 2005–2006 budget provides AU$2.5 billion for development assistance. Australia ranks fifteenth overall in the Center for Global Development's 2012 Commitment to Development Index.Australia's armed forces—the Australian Defence Force (ADF) — comprise the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), the Australian Army and the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), in total numbering 81,214 personnel (including 57,982 regulars and 23,232 reservists) . The titular role of Commander-in-Chief is vested in the Governor-General, who appoints a Chief of the Defence Force from one of the armed services on the advice of the government. In a diarchy, the CDF serves as co-chairman of the Defence Committee, conjointly with the Secretary of Defence, in the command and control of the Australian Defence Organisation.In the 2016–2017 budget, defence spending comprised 2% of GDP, representing the world's 12th largest defence budget. Australia has been involved in United Nations and regional peacekeeping, disaster relief and armed conflict, including the 2003 invasion of Iraq; Australia currently has deployed about 2,241 personnel in varying capacities to 12 international operations in areas including Iraq and Afghanistan.A wealthy country, Australia has a market economy, a high GDP per capita, and a relatively low rate of poverty. In terms of average wealth, Australia ranked second in the world after Switzerland from 2013 until 2018. In 2018, Australia overtook Switzerland and became the country with the highest average wealth. Australia's relative poverty rate is 13.6%. It was identified by the Credit Suisse Research Institute as the nation with the highest median wealth in the world and the second-highest average wealth per adult in 2013.The Australian dollar is the currency for the nation, including Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and Norfolk Island, as well as the independent Pacific Island states of Kiribati, Nauru, and Tuvalu. With the 2006 merger of the Australian Stock Exchange and the Sydney Futures Exchange, the Australian Securities Exchange became the ninth largest in the world.Ranked fifth in the Index of Economic Freedom (2017), Australia is the world's 13th largest economy and has the tenth highest per capita GDP (nominal) at US$55,692. The country was ranked third in the United Nations 2017 Human Development Index. Melbourne reached top spot for the fourth year in a row on "The Economist"s 2014 list of the world's most liveable cities, followed by Adelaide, Sydney, and Perth in the fifth, seventh, and ninth places respectively. Total government debt in Australia is about A$190 billion—20% of GDP in 2010. Australia has among the highest house prices and some of the highest household debt levels in the world.An emphasis on exporting commodities rather than manufactured goods has underpinned a significant increase in Australia's terms of trade since the start of the 21st century, due to rising commodity prices. Australia has a balance of payments that is more than 7% of GDP negative, and has had persistently large current account deficits for more than 50 years. Australia has grown at an average annual rate of 3.6% for over 15 years, in comparison to the OECD annual average of 2.5%.Australia was the only advanced economy not to experience a recession due to the global financial downturn in 2008–2009. However, the economies of six of Australia's major trading partners were in recession, which in turn affected Australia, significantly hampering its economic growth. From 2012 to early 2013, Australia's national economy grew, but some non-mining states and Australia's non-mining economy experienced a recession.The Hawke Government floated the Australian dollar in 1983 and partially deregulated the financial system. The Howard Government followed with a partial deregulation of the labour market and the further privatisation of state-owned businesses, most notably in the telecommunications industry. The indirect tax system was substantially changed in July 2000 with the introduction of a 10% Goods and Services Tax (GST). In Australia's tax system, personal and company income tax are the main sources of government revenue., there were 12,640,800 people employed (either full- or part-time), with an unemployment rate of 5.2%. Data released in mid-November 2013 showed that the number of welfare recipients had grown by 55%. In 2007 228,621 Newstart unemployment allowance recipients were registered, a total that increased to 646,414 in March 2013. According to the Graduate Careers Survey, full-time employment for newly qualified professionals from various occupations has declined since 2011 but it increases for graduates three years after graduation.Access to biocapacity in Australia is much higher than world average. In 2016, Australia had 12.3 global hectares of biocapacity per person within its territory, much more than the world average of 1.6 global hectares per person. In 2016 Australia used 6.6 global hectares of biocapacity per person – their ecological footprint of consumption. This means they use half as much biocapacity as Australia contains. As a result, Australia is running a biocapacity reserve.In 2020 the Australian Council of Social Service released a report stating that relative poverty was growing in Australia, with an estimated 3.2 million people, or 13.6% of the population, living below an internationally accepted relative poverty threshold of 50% of a country's median income. It also estimated that there were 774,000 (17.7%) children under the age of 15 in relative poverty.Australia has an average population density of / 7682300 round 1 persons per square kilometre of total land area, which makes it one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world. The population is heavily concentrated on the east coast, and in particular in the south-eastern region between South East Queensland to the north-east and Adelaide to the south-west.Australia is highly urbanised, with 67% of the population living in the Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (metropolitan areas of the state and mainland territorial capital cities) in 2018. Metropolitan areas with more than one million inhabitants are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.In common with many other developed countries, Australia is experiencing a demographic shift towards an older population, with more retirees and fewer people of working age. In 2018 the average age of the Australian population was 38.8 years. In 2015, 2.15% of the Australian population lived overseas, one of the worldwide.Between 1788 and the Second World War, the vast majority of settlers and immigrants came from the British Isles (principally England, Ireland and Scotland), although there was significant immigration from China and Germany during the 19th century. In the decades immediately following the Second World War, Australia received a large wave of immigration from across Europe, with many more immigrants arriving from Southern and Eastern Europe than in previous decades. Since the end of the White Australia policy in 1973, Australia has pursued an official policy of multiculturalism, and there has been a large and continuing wave of immigration from across the world, with Asia being the largest source of immigrants in the 21st century.Today, Australia has the world's eighth-largest immigrant population, with immigrants accounting for 30% of the population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. 160,323 permanent immigrants were admitted to Australia in 2018–2019 (excluding refugees), whilst there was a net population gain of 239,600 people from all permanent and temporary immigration in that year. The majority of immigrants are skilled, but the immigration program includes categories for family members and refugees. In 2020, the largest foreign-born populations were those born in England (3.8%), India (2.8%), Mainland China (2.5%), New Zealand (2.2%), the Philippines (1.2%) and Vietnam (1.1%).In the 2016 Australian census, the most commonly nominated ancestries were: At the 2016 census, 649,171 people (2.8% of the total population) identified as being Indigenous — Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders. Indigenous Australians experience higher than average rates of imprisonment and unemployment, lower levels of education, and life expectancies for males and females that are, respectively, 11 and 17 years lower than those of non-indigenous Australians. Some remote Indigenous communities have been described as having "failed state"-like conditions.Although Australia has no official language, English is the "de facto" national language. Australian English is a major variety of the language with a distinctive accent and lexicon, and differs slightly from other varieties of English in grammar and spelling. General Australian serves as the standard dialect.According to the 2016 census, English is the only language spoken in the home for 72.7% of the population. The next most common languages spoken at home are Mandarin (2.5%), Arabic (1.4%), Cantonese (1.2%), Vietnamese (1.2%) and Italian (1.2%). Over 250 Indigenous Australian languages are thought to have existed at the time of first European contact, of which fewer than twenty are still in daily use by all age groups. About 110 others are spoken exclusively by older people. At the time of the 2006 census, 52,000 Indigenous Australians, representing 12% of the Indigenous population, reported that they spoke an Indigenous language at home. Australia has a sign language known as Auslan, which is the main language of about 10,112 deaf people who reported that they spoke Auslan language at home in the 2016 census.Australia has no state religion; Section 116 of the Australian Constitution prohibits the federal government from making any law to establish any religion, impose any religious observance, or prohibit the free exercise of any religion. In the 2016 census, 52.1% of Australians were counted as Christian, including 22.6% as Catholic and 13.3% as Anglican; 30.1% of the population reported having "no religion"; 8.2% identify with non-Christian religions, the largest of these being Islam (2.6%), followed by Buddhism (2.4%), Hinduism (1.9%), Sikhism (0.5%) and Judaism (0.4%). The remaining 9.7% of the population did not provide an adequate answer. Those who reported having no religion increased conspicuously from 19% in 2006 to 22% in 2011 to 30.1% in 2016.Before European settlement, the animist beliefs of Australia's indigenous people had been practised for many thousands of years. Mainland Aboriginal Australians' spirituality is known as the Dreaming and it places a heavy emphasis on belonging to the land. The collection of stories that it contains shaped Aboriginal law and customs. Aboriginal art, story and dance continue to draw on these spiritual traditions. The spirituality and customs of Torres Strait Islanders, who inhabit the islands between Australia and New Guinea, reflected their Melanesian origins and dependence on the sea. The 1996 Australian census counted more than 7000 respondents as followers of a traditional Aboriginal religion.Since the arrival of the First Fleet of British ships in 1788, Christianity has become the major religion practised in Australia. Christian churches have played an integral role in the development of education, health and welfare services in Australia. For much of Australian history, the Church of England (now known as the Anglican Church of Australia) was the largest religious denomination, with a large Roman Catholic minority. However, multicultural immigration has contributed to a steep decline in its relative position since the Second World War. Similarly, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism and Judaism have all grown in Australia over the past half-century.Australia has one of the lowest levels of religious adherence in the world. In 2018, 13% of women and 10% of men reported attending church at least weekly.Australia's life expectancy is the fourth highest in the world for males and the third highest for females. Life expectancy in Australia in 2014–2016 was 80.4 years for males and 84.6 years for females. Australia has the highest rates of skin cancer in the world, while cigarette smoking is the largest preventable cause of death and disease, responsible for 7.8% of the total mortality and disease. Ranked second in preventable causes is hypertension at 7.6%, with obesity third at 7.5%. Australia ranks 35th in the world and near the top of developed nations for its proportion of obese adults and nearly two thirds (63%) of its adult population is either overweight or obese.Total expenditure on health (including private sector spending) is around 9.8% of GDP. Australia introduced universal health care in 1975. Known as Medicare, it is now nominally funded by an income tax surcharge known as the Medicare levy, currently at 2%. The states manage hospitals and attached outpatient services, while the Commonwealth funds the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (subsidising the costs of medicines) and general practice.School attendance, or registration for home schooling, is compulsory throughout Australia. Education is the responsibility of the individual states and territories so the rules vary between states, but in general children are required to attend school from the age of about 5 until about 16. In some states (e.g., Western Australia, the Northern Territory and New South Wales), children aged 16–17 are required to either attend school or participate in vocational training, such as an apprenticeship.Australia has an adult literacy rate that was estimated to be 99% in 2003. However, a 2011–2012 report for the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that Tasmania has a literacy and numeracy rate of only 50%.Australia has 37 government-funded universities and three private universities, as well as a number of other specialist institutions that provide approved courses at the higher education level. The OECD places Australia among the most expensive nations to attend university. There is a state-based system of vocational training, known as TAFE, and many trades conduct apprenticeships for training new tradespeople. About 58% of Australians aged from 25 to 64 have vocational or tertiary qualifications, and the tertiary graduation rate of 49% is the highest among OECD countries. 30.9% of Australia's population has attained a higher education qualification, which is among the highest percentages in the world.Australia has the highest ratio of international students per head of population in the world by a large margin, with 812,000 international students enrolled in the nation's universities and vocational institutions in 2019. Accordingly, in 2019, international students represented on average 26.7% of the student bodies of Australian universities. International education therefore represents one of the country's largest exports and has a pronounced influence on the country's demographics, with a significant proportion of international students remaining in Australia after graduation on various skill and employment visas.In 2003, Australia's energy sources were coal (58.4%), hydropower (19.1%), natural gas (13.5%), liquid/gas fossil fuel-switching plants (5.4%), oil (2.9%), and other renewable resources like wind power, solar energy, and bioenergy (0.7%). During the 21st century, Australia has been trending to generate more energy using renewable resources and less energy using fossil fuels. In 2020, Australia used coal for 62% of all energy (3.6% increase compared to 2013), wind power for 9.9% (9.5% increase), natural gas for 9.9% (3.6% decrease), solar power for 9.9% (9.8% increase), hydropower for 6.4% (12.7% decrease), bioenergy for 1.4% (1.2% increase), and other sources like oil and waste coal mine gas for 0.5%.In August 2009, Australia's government set a goal to achieve 20% of all energy in the country from renewable sources by 2020. They achieved this goal, as renewable resources accounted for 27.7% of Australia's energy in 2020.Since 1788, the primary influence behind Australian culture has been Anglo-Celtic Western culture, with some Indigenous influences. The divergence and evolution that has occurred in the ensuing centuries has resulted in a distinctive Australian culture. The culture of the United States has served as a significant influence, particularly through television and cinema. Other cultural influences come from neighbouring Asian countries, and through large-scale immigration from non-English-speaking nations.Australia has over 100,000 Aboriginal rock art sites, and traditional designs, patterns and stories infuse contemporary Indigenous Australian art, "the last great art movement of the 20th century" according to critic Robert Hughes; its exponents include Emily Kame Kngwarreye. Early colonial artists showed a fascination with the unfamiliar land. The impressionistic works of Arthur Streeton, Tom Roberts and other members of the 19th-century Heidelberg School—the first "distinctively Australian" movement in Western art—gave expression to nationalist sentiments in the lead-up to Federation. While the school remained influential into the 1900s, modernists such as Margaret Preston, and, later, Sidney Nolan and Arthur Boyd, explored new artistic trends. The landscape remained a central subject matter for Fred Williams, Brett Whiteley and other post-war artists whose works, eclectic in style yet uniquely Australian, moved between the figurative and the abstract. The national and state galleries maintain collections of local and international art. Australia has one of the world's highest attendances of art galleries and museums per head of population.Australian literature grew slowly in the decades following European settlement though Indigenous oral traditions, many of which have since been recorded in writing, are much older. In the 1870s, Adam Lindsay Gordon posthumously became the first Australian poet to attain a wide readership. Following in his footsteps, Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson captured the experience of the bush using a distinctive Australian vocabulary. Their works are still popular; Paterson's bush poem "Waltzing Matilda" (1895) is regarded as Australia's unofficial national anthem. Miles Franklin is the namesake of Australia's most prestigious literary prize, awarded annually to the best novel about Australian life. Its first recipient, Patrick White, went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1973. Australian Booker Prize winners include Peter Carey, Thomas Keneally and Richard Flanagan. Authors David Malouf, Germaine Greer, Helen Garner, playwright David Williamson and poet Les Murray are also renowned.Many of Australia's performing arts companies receive funding through the federal government's Australia Council. There is a symphony orchestra in each state, and a national opera company, Opera Australia, well known for its famous soprano Joan Sutherland. At the beginning of the 20th century, Nellie Melba was one of the world's leading opera singers. Ballet and dance are represented by The Australian Ballet and various state companies. Each state has a publicly funded theatre company."The Story of the Kelly Gang" (1906), the world's first feature-length narrative film, spurred a boom in Australian cinema during the silent film era. After World War I, Hollywood monopolised the industry, and by the 1960s Australian film production had effectively ceased. With the benefit of government support, the Australian New Wave of the 1970s brought provocative and successful films, many exploring themes of national identity, such as "Wake in Fright" and "Gallipoli", while "Crocodile Dundee" and the Ozploitation movement's "Mad Max" series became international blockbusters. In a film market flooded with foreign content, Australian films delivered a 7.7% share of the local box office in 2015. The AACTAs are Australia's premier film and television awards, and notable Academy Award winners from Australia include Geoffrey Rush, Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett and Heath Ledger.Australia has two public broadcasters (the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the multicultural Special Broadcasting Service), three commercial television networks, several pay-TV services, and numerous public, non-profit television and radio stations. Each major city has at least one daily newspaper, and there are two national daily newspapers, "The Australian" and "The Australian Financial Review". In 2010, Reporters Without Borders placed Australia 18th on a list of 178 countries ranked by press freedom, behind New Zealand (8th) but ahead of the United Kingdom (19th) and United States (20th). This relatively low ranking is primarily because of the limited diversity of commercial media ownership in Australia; most print media are under the control of News Corporation and, after Fairfax Media was merged with Nine, Nine Entertainment Co.Most Indigenous Australian groups subsisted on a simple hunter-gatherer diet of native fauna and flora, otherwise called bush tucker. The first settlers introduced British food to the continent, much of which is now considered typical Australian food, such as the Sunday roast. Multicultural immigration transformed Australian cuisine; post-World War II European migrants, particularly from the Mediterranean, helped to build a thriving Australian coffee culture, and the influence of Asian cultures has led to Australian variants of their staple foods, such as the Chinese-inspired dim sim and Chiko Roll. Vegemite, pavlova, lamingtons and meat pies are regarded as iconic Australian foods.Australian wine is produced mainly in the southern, cooler parts of the country. Australia is also known for its cafe and coffee culture in urban centres, which has influenced coffee culture abroad, including New York City. Australia was responsible for the flat white coffee–purported to have originated in a Sydney cafe in the mid-1980s.Cricket and football are the predominate sports in Australia during the summer and winter months, respectively. Australia is unique in that it has professional leagues for four football codes. Originating in Melbourne in the 1850s, Australian rules football is the most popular code in all states except New South Wales and Queensland, where rugby league holds sway, followed by rugby union; the imaginary border separating areas where Australian rules football dominates from those were the two rugby codes prevail is known as the Barassi Line. Soccer, while ranked fourth in popularity and resources, has the highest overall participation rates. Cricket is popular across all borders and has been regarded by many Australians as the national sport. The Australian national cricket team competed against England in the first Test match (1877) and the first One Day International (1971), and against New Zealand in the first Twenty20 International (2004), winning all three games. It has also participated in every edition of the Cricket World Cup, winning the tournament a record five times.Australia is also notable for water-based sports, such as swimming and surfing. The surf lifesaving movement originated in Australia, and the volunteer lifesaver is one of the country's icons. Nationally, other popular sports include horse racing, basketball, and motor racing. The annual Melbourne Cup horse race and the Sydney to Hobart yacht race attract intense interest. In 2016, the Australian Sports Commission revealed that swimming, cycling and soccer are the three most popular participation sports.Australia is one of five nations to have participated in every Summer Olympics of the modern era, and has hosted the Games twice: 1956 in Melbourne and 2000 in Sydney. Australia has also participated in every Commonwealth Games, hosting the event in 1938, 1962, 1982, 2006 and 2018. Australia made its inaugural appearance at the Pacific Games in 2015. As well as being a regular FIFA World Cup participant, Australia has won the OFC Nations Cup four times and the AFC Asian Cup once—the only country to have won championships in two different FIFA confederations. In June 2020, Australia won its bid to co-host the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup with New Zealand. The country regularly competes among the world elite basketball teams as it is among the global top three teams in terms of qualifications to the Basketball Tournament at the Summer Olympics. Other major international events held in Australia include the Australian Open tennis grand slam tournament, international cricket matches, and the Australian Formula One Grand Prix. The highest-rating television programs include sports telecasts such as the Summer Olympics, FIFA World Cup, The Ashes, Rugby League State of Origin, and the grand finals of the National Rugby League and Australian Football League. Skiing in Australia began in the 1860s and snow sports take place in the Australian Alps and parts of Tasmania.
|
[
"Billy Hughes",
"Gough Whitlam",
"Malcolm Fraser",
"Joseph Cook",
"George Reid",
"John McEwen",
"Scott Morrison",
"Arthur Fadden",
"Malcolm Turnbull",
"Robert Menzies",
"Andrew Fisher",
"Harold Holt",
"Earle Page",
"John Howard",
"Edmund Barton",
"Frank Forde",
"Kevin Rudd",
"Tony Abbott",
"Ben Chifley",
"William McMahon",
"Paul Keating",
"Julia Gillard",
"Chris Watson",
"Anthony Albanese",
"Stanley Bruce",
"John Gorton",
"James Scullin",
"Bob Hawke",
"Alfred Deakin",
"John Curtin"
] |
|
Who was the head of Australia in 1937-11-05?
|
November 05, 1937
|
{
"text": [
"Joseph Lyons"
]
}
|
L2_Q408_P6_9
|
Arthur Fadden is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1941 to Oct, 1941.
James Scullin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1929 to Jan, 1932.
Edmund Barton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1901 to Sep, 1903.
Tony Abbott is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2013 to Sep, 2015.
Joseph Lyons is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1932 to Apr, 1939.
John McEwen is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1967 to Jan, 1968.
Alfred Deakin is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1905 to Nov, 1908.
Julia Gillard is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 2010 to Jun, 2013.
Chris Watson is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1904 to Aug, 1904.
Andrew Fisher is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1908 to Jun, 1909.
Scott Morrison is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 2018 to May, 2022.
John Gorton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1968 to Mar, 1971.
Robert Menzies is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1949 to Jan, 1966.
Frank Forde is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Jul, 1945.
Ben Chifley is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Dec, 1949.
Malcolm Turnbull is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2015 to Aug, 2018.
Bob Hawke is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1983 to Dec, 1991.
Billy Hughes is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1915 to Feb, 1923.
Joseph Cook is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 1913 to Sep, 1914.
John Howard is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1996 to Mar, 2007.
John Curtin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1941 to Jul, 1945.
Harold Holt is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1966 to Dec, 1967.
Malcolm Fraser is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1975 to Mar, 1983.
Anthony Albanese is the head of the government of Australia from May, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
Kevin Rudd is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 2007 to Jun, 2010.
George Reid is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1904 to Jul, 1905.
Stanley Bruce is the head of the government of Australia from Feb, 1923 to Oct, 1929.
Paul Keating is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1991 to Mar, 1996.
Gough Whitlam is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1972 to Nov, 1975.
William McMahon is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1971 to Dec, 1972.
Earle Page is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1939 to Apr, 1939.
|
AustraliaAustralia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia's population of nearly / 1000000 round 0 million, in an area of , is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Canberra is the nation's capital, while the largest city is Sydney, and other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide.Indigenous Australians inhabited the continent for about 65,000 years, prior to the first arrival of Dutch explorers in the early 17th century, who named it New Holland. In 1770, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain and initially settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788, a date which became Australia's national day. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the time of an 1850s gold rush, most of the continent had been explored by European settlers and an additional five self-governing crown colonies established. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy, comprising six states and ten territories.Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, and mountain ranges in the south-east. Australia generates its income from various sources, including mining-related exports, telecommunications, banking, manufacturing, and international education.Australia is a highly developed country, with the world's twelfth-largest economy. It has a high-income economy, with the world's tenth-highest per capita income. Australia is a regional power, and has the world's thirteenth-highest military expenditure. Immigrants account for 30% of the country's population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. Having the eight-highest Human Development Index, and the ninth-highest ranked democracy globally as of 2020, Australia ranks highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom, civil liberties, and political rights, with all its major cities faring exceptionally in global comparative livability surveys. It is a member of the United Nations, the G20, the Commonwealth of Nations, the ANZUS, the OECD, the WTO, the APEC, the Pacific Islands Forum, the Pacific Community and the ASEAN + 6 mechanism.The name "Australia" (pronounced in Australian English) is derived from the Latin "Terra Australis" ("southern land"), a name used for a hypothetical continent in the Southern Hemisphere since ancient times. When Europeans first began visiting and mapping Australia in the 17th century, the name "Terra Australis" was naturally applied to the new territories.Until the early 19th century, Australia was best known as "New Holland", a name first applied by the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in 1644 (as "Nieuw-Holland") and subsequently anglicised. "Terra Australis" still saw occasional usage, such as in scientific texts. The name "Australia" was popularised by the explorer Matthew Flinders, who said it was "more agreeable to the ear, and an assimilation to the names of the other great portions of the Earth". Several famous early cartographers also made use of the word Australia on maps. Gerardus Mercator used the phrase "climata " on his double cordiform map of the world of 1538, as did Gemma Frisius, who was Mercator's teacher and collaborator, on his own cordiform wall map in 1540. Australia appears in a book on astronomy by Cyriaco Jacob zum Barth published in Frankfurt am Main in 1545.The first time that "Australia" appears to have been officially used was in April 1817, when Governor Lachlan Macquarie acknowledged the receipt of Flinders' charts of Australia from Lord Bathurst. In December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted. In 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially by that name. The first official published use of the new name came with the publication in 1830 of "The Australia Directory" by the Hydrographic Office.Colloquial names for Australia include "Oz" and "the Land Down Under" (usually shortened to just "Down Under"). Other epithets include "the Great Southern Land", "the Lucky Country", "the Sunburnt Country", and "the Wide Brown Land". The latter two both derive from Dorothea Mackellar's 1908 poem "My Country".Human habitation of the Australian continent is known to have begun at least 65,000 years ago, with the migration of people by land bridges and short sea-crossings from what is now Southeast Asia. The Madjedbebe rock shelter in Arnhem Land is recognised as the oldest site showing the presence of humans in Australia. The oldest human remains found are the Lake Mungo remains, which have been dated to around 41,000 years ago. These people were the ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. Aboriginal Australian culture is one of the oldest continual cultures on Earth.At the time of first European contact, most Indigenous Australians were hunter-gatherers with complex economies and societies. Recent archaeological finds suggest that a population of 750,000 could have been sustained. Indigenous Australians have an oral culture with spiritual values based on reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, obtained their livelihood from seasonal horticulture and the resources of their reefs and seas. The northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by Makassan fishermen from what is now Indonesia.The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the "Duyfken" captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, and made landfall on 26 February 1606 at the Pennefather River near the modern town of Weipa on Cape York. Later that year, Spanish explorer Luís Vaz de Torres sailed through, and navigated, Torres Strait islands. The Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent "New Holland" during the 17th century, and although no attempt at settlement was made, a number of shipwrecks left men either stranded or, as in the case of the "Batavia" in 1629, marooned for mutiny and murder, thus becoming the first Europeans to permanently inhabit the continent. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688 (while serving as a crewman under pirate Captain John Read) and again in 1699 on a return trip. In 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain.With the loss of its American colonies in 1783, the British Government sent a fleet of ships, the "First Fleet", under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip, to establish a new penal colony in New South Wales. A camp was set up and the Union flag raised at Sydney Cove, Port Jackson, on 26 January 1788, a date which later became Australia's national day, Australia Day. Most early convicts were transported for petty crimes and assigned as labourers or servants upon arrival. While the majority settled into colonial society once emancipated, convict rebellions and uprisings were also staged, but invariably suppressed under martial law. The 1808 Rum Rebellion, the only successful armed takeover of government in Australia, instigated a two-year period of military rule.The indigenous population declined for 150 years following settlement, mainly due to infectious disease. Thousands more died as a result of frontier conflict with settlers. A government policy of "assimilation" beginning with the "Aboriginal Protection Act 1869" resulted in the removal of many Aboriginal children from their families and communities—referred to as the Stolen Generations — a practice which also contributed to the decline in the indigenous population. As a result of the 1967 referendum, the Federal government's power to enact special laws with respect to a particular race was extended to enable the making of laws with respect to Aboriginals. Traditional ownership of land ("native title") was not recognised in law until 1992, when the High Court of Australia held in "Mabo v Queensland (No 2)" that the legal doctrine that Australia had been "terra nullius" ("land belonging to no one") did not apply to Australia at the time of British settlement.The expansion of British control over other areas of the continent began in the early 19th century, initially confined to coastal regions. A settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land (present-day Tasmania) in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. In 1813, Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Wentworth crossed the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, opening the interior to European settlement. The British claim was extended to the whole Australian continent in 1827 when Major Edmund Lockyer established a settlement on King George Sound (modern-day Albany). The Swan River Colony (present-day Perth) was established in 1829, evolving into the largest Australian colony by area, Western Australia. In accordance with population growth, separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales: South Australia in 1836, New Zealand in 1841, Victoria in 1851, and Queensland in 1859. The Northern Territory was excised from South Australia in 1911. South Australia was founded as a "free province" — it was never a penal colony. Western Australia was also founded "free" but later accepted transported convicts, the last of which arrived in 1868, decades after transportation had ceased to the other colonies. In the mid-19th century, explorers such as Burke and Wills went further inland to determine its agricultural potential and answer scientific questions.A series of gold rushes beginning in the early 1850s led to an influx of new migrants from China, North America and continental Europe, and also spurred outbreaks of bushranging and civil unrest; the latter peaked in 1854 when Ballarat miners launched the Eureka Rebellion against gold license fees. Between 1855 and 1890, the six colonies individually gained responsible government, managing most of their own affairs while remaining part of the British Empire. The Colonial Office in London retained control of some matters, notably foreign affairs and defence.On 1 January 1901, federation of the colonies was achieved after a decade of planning, consultation and voting. After the 1907 Imperial Conference, Australia and the other self-governing British colonies were given the status of "dominion" within the British Empire. The Federal Capital Territory (later renamed the Australian Capital Territory) was formed in 1911 as the location for the future federal capital of Canberra. Melbourne was the temporary seat of government from 1901 to 1927 while Canberra was being constructed. The Northern Territory was transferred from the control of the South Australian government to the federal parliament in 1911. Australia became the colonial ruler of the Territory of Papua (which had initially been annexed by Queensland in 1883) in 1902 and of the Territory of New Guinea (formerly German New Guinea) in 1920. The two were unified as the Territory of Papua and New Guinea in 1949 and gained independence from Australia in 1975.In 1914, Australia joined Britain in fighting World War I, with support from both the outgoing Commonwealth Liberal Party and the incoming Australian Labor Party. Australians took part in many of the major battles fought on the Western Front. Of about 416,000 who served, about 60,000 were killed and another 152,000 were wounded. Many Australians regard the defeat of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs) at Gallipoli as the birth of the nation — its first major military action. The Kokoda Track campaign is regarded by many as an analogous nation-defining event during World War II.Britain's Statute of Westminster 1931 formally ended most of the constitutional links between Australia and the United Kingdom. Australia adopted it in 1942, but it was backdated to 1939 to confirm the validity of legislation passed by the Australian Parliament during World War II. The shock of Britain's defeat in Asia in 1942, followed soon after by the bombing of Darwin and other Japanese attacks, led to a widespread belief in Australia that an invasion was imminent, and a shift towards the United States as a new ally and protector. Since 1951, Australia has been a formal military ally of the United States, under the ANZUS treaty.After World War II, Australia encouraged immigration from mainland Europe. Since the 1970s and following the abolition of the White Australia policy, immigration from Asia and elsewhere was also promoted. As a result, Australia's demography, culture, and self-image were transformed. The "Australia Act 1986" severed the remaining constitutional ties between Australia and the United Kingdom. In a 1999 referendum, 55% of voters and a majority in every state rejected a proposal to become a republic with a president appointed by a two-thirds vote in both Houses of the Australian Parliament. There has been an increasing focus in foreign policy on ties with other Pacific Rim nations while maintaining close ties with Australia's traditional allies and trading partners.Surrounded by the Indian and Pacific oceans, Australia is separated from Asia by the Arafura and Timor seas, with the Coral Sea lying off the Queensland coast, and the Tasman Sea lying between Australia and New Zealand. The world's smallest continent and sixth largest country by total area, Australia—owing to its size and isolation—is often dubbed the "island continent" and is sometimes considered the world's largest island. Australia has of coastline (excluding all offshore islands), and claims an extensive Exclusive Economic Zone of . This exclusive economic zone does not include the Australian Antarctic Territory.Mainland Australia lies between latitudes 9° and 44° South, and longitudes 112° and 154° East. Australia's size gives it a wide variety of landscapes, with tropical rainforests in the north-east, mountain ranges in the south-east, south-west and east, and desert in the centre. The desert or semi-arid land commonly known as the outback makes up by far the largest portion of land. Australia is the driest inhabited continent; its annual rainfall averaged over continental area is less than 500 mm. The population density is 3.2 inhabitants per square kilometre, although a large proportion of the population lives along the temperate south-eastern coastline.The Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest coral reef, lies a short distance off the north-east coast and extends for over . Mount Augustus, claimed to be the world's largest monolith, is located in Western Australia. At , Mount Kosciuszko is the highest mountain on the Australian mainland. Even taller are Mawson Peak (at ), on the remote Australian external territory of Heard Island, and, in the Australian Antarctic Territory, Mount McClintock and Mount Menzies, at and respectively.Eastern Australia is marked by the Great Dividing Range, which runs parallel to the coast of Queensland, New South Wales and much of Victoria. The name is not strictly accurate, because parts of the range consist of low hills, and the highlands are typically no more than in height. The coastal uplands and a belt of Brigalow grasslands lie between the coast and the mountains, while inland of the dividing range are large areas of grassland and shrubland. These include the western plains of New South Wales, and the Mitchell Grass Downs and Mulga Lands of inland Queensland. The northernmost point of the mainland is the tropical Cape York Peninsula.The landscapes of the Top End and the Gulf Country—with their tropical climate—include forest, woodland, wetland, grassland, rainforest and desert. At the north-west corner of the continent are the sandstone cliffs and gorges of The Kimberley, and below that the Pilbara. The Victoria Plains tropical savanna lies south of the Kimberly and Arnhem Land savannas, forming a transition between the coastal savannas and the interior deserts. At the heart of the country are the uplands of central Australia. Prominent features of the centre and south include Uluru (also known as Ayers Rock), the famous sandstone monolith, and the inland Simpson, Tirari and Sturt Stony, Gibson, Great Sandy, Tanami, and Great Victoria deserts, with the famous Nullarbor Plain on the southern coast. The Western Australian mulga shrublands lie between the interior deserts and Mediterranean-climate Southwest Australia.Lying on the Indo-Australian Plate, the mainland of Australia is the lowest and most primordial landmass on Earth with a relatively stable geological history. The landmass includes virtually all known rock types and from all geological time periods spanning over 3.8 billion years of the Earth's history. The Pilbara Craton is one of only two pristine Archaean 3.6–2.7 Ga (billion years ago) crusts identified on the Earth.Having been part of all major supercontinents, the Australian continent began to form after the breakup of Gondwana in the Permian, with the separation of the continental landmass from the African continent and Indian subcontinent. It separated from Antarctica over a prolonged period beginning in the Permian and continuing through to the Cretaceous. When the last glacial period ended in about 10,000 BC, rising sea levels formed Bass Strait, separating Tasmania from the mainland. Then between about 8,000 and 6,500 BC, the lowlands in the north were flooded by the sea, separating New Guinea, the Aru Islands, and the mainland of Australia. The Australian continent is moving toward Eurasia at the rate of 6 to 7 centimetres a year.The Australian mainland's continental crust, excluding the thinned margins, has an average thickness of 38km, with a range in thickness from 24 km to 59 km. Australia's geology can be divided into several main sections, showcasing that the continent grew from west to east: the Archaean cratonic shields found mostly in the west, Proterozoic fold belts in the centre and Phanerozoic sedimentary basins, metamorphic and igneous rocks in the east.The Australian mainland and Tasmania are situated in the middle of the tectonic plate and have no active volcanoes, but due to passing over the East Australia hotspot, recent volcanism has occurred during the Holocene, in the Newer Volcanics Province of western Victoria and southeastern South Australia. Volcanism also occurs in the island of New Guinea (considered geologically as part of the Australian continent), and in the Australian external territory of Heard Island and McDonald Islands. Seismic activity in the Australian mainland and Tasmania is also low, with the greatest number of fatalities having occurred in the 1989 Newcastle earthquake.The climate of Australia is significantly influenced by ocean currents, including the Indian Ocean Dipole and the El Niño–Southern Oscillation, which is correlated with periodic drought, and the seasonal tropical low-pressure system that produces cyclones in northern Australia. These factors cause rainfall to vary markedly from year to year. Much of the northern part of the country has a tropical, predominantly summer-rainfall (monsoon). The south-west corner of the country has a Mediterranean climate. The south-east ranges from oceanic (Tasmania and coastal Victoria) to humid subtropical (upper half of New South Wales), with the highlands featuring alpine and subpolar oceanic climates. The interior is arid to semi-arid.Driven by climate change, average temperatures have risen more than 1°C since 1960. Associated changes in rainfall patterns and climate extremes exacerbate existing issues such as drought and bushfires. 2019 was Australia's warmest recorded year, and the 2019–2020 bushfire season was the country's worst on record. Australia's greenhouse gas emissions per capita are among the highest in the world.Water restrictions are frequently in place in many regions and cities of Australia in response to chronic shortages due to urban population increases and localised drought. Throughout much of the continent, major flooding regularly follows extended periods of drought, flushing out inland river systems, overflowing dams and inundating large inland flood plains, as occurred throughout Eastern Australia in the early 2010s after the 2000s Australian drought.Although most of Australia is semi-arid or desert, the continent includes a diverse range of habitats from alpine heaths to tropical rainforests. Fungi typify that diversity—an estimated 250,000 species—of which only 5% have been described—occur in Australia. Because of the continent's great age, extremely variable weather patterns, and long-term geographic isolation, much of Australia's biota is unique. About 85% of flowering plants, 84% of mammals, more than 45% of birds, and 89% of in-shore, temperate-zone fish are endemic. Australia has at least 755 species of reptile, more than any other country in the world. Besides Antarctica, Australia is the only continent that developed without feline species. Feral cats may have been introduced in the 17th century by Dutch shipwrecks, and later in the 18th century by European settlers. They are now considered a major factor in the decline and extinction of many vulnerable and endangered native species. Australia is also one of 17 megadiverse countries.Australian forests are mostly made up of evergreen species, particularly eucalyptus trees in the less arid regions; wattles replace them as the dominant species in drier regions and deserts. Among well-known Australian animals are the monotremes (the platypus and echidna); a host of marsupials, including the kangaroo, koala, and wombat, and birds such as the emu and the kookaburra. Australia is home to many dangerous animals including some of the most venomous snakes in the world. The dingo was introduced by Austronesian people who traded with Indigenous Australians around 3000 BCE. Many animal and plant species became extinct soon after first human settlement, including the Australian megafauna; others have disappeared since European settlement, among them the thylacine.Many of Australia's ecoregions, and the species within those regions, are threatened by human activities and introduced animal, chromistan, fungal and plant species. All these factors have led to Australia's having the highest mammal extinction rate of any country in the world. The federal "Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999" is the legal framework for the protection of threatened species. Numerous protected areas have been created under the National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia's Biological Diversity to protect and preserve unique ecosystems; 65 wetlands are listed under the Ramsar Convention, and 16 natural World Heritage Sites have been established. Australia was ranked 21st out of 178 countries in the world on the 2018 Environmental Performance Index. There are more than 1,800 animals and plants on Australia's threatened species list, including more than 500 animals.Australia is a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy. The country has maintained a stable liberal democratic political system under its constitution, which is one of the world's oldest, since Federation in 1901. It is also one of the world's oldest federations, in which power is divided between the federal and state and territorial governments. The Australian system of government combines elements derived from the political systems of the United Kingdom (a fused executive, constitutional monarchy and strong party discipline) and the United States (federalism, a written constitution and strong bicameralism with an elected upper house), along with distinctive indigenous features.The federal government is separated into three branches:Elizabeth II reigns as Queen of Australia and is represented in Australia by the governor-general at the federal level and by the governors at the state level, who by convention act on the advice of her ministers. Thus, in practice the governor-general acts as a legal figurehead for the actions of the prime minister and the Federal Executive Council. The governor-general does have extraordinary reserve powers which may be exercised outside the prime minister's request in rare and limited circumstances, the most notable exercise of which was the dismissal of the Whitlam Government in the constitutional crisis of 1975.In the Senate (the upper house), there are 76 senators: twelve each from the states and two each from the mainland territories (the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory). The House of Representatives (the lower house) has 151 members elected from single-member electoral divisions, commonly known as "electorates" or "seats", allocated to states on the basis of population, with each original state guaranteed a minimum of five seats. Elections for both chambers are normally held every three years simultaneously; senators have overlapping six-year terms except for those from the territories, whose terms are not fixed but are tied to the electoral cycle for the lower house; thus only 40 of the 76 places in the Senate are put to each election unless the cycle is interrupted by a double dissolution.Australia's electoral system uses preferential voting for all lower house elections with the exception of Tasmania and the ACT which, along with the Senate and most state upper houses, combine it with proportional representation in a system known as the single transferable vote. Voting is compulsory for all enrolled citizens 18 years and over in every jurisdiction, as is enrolment. The party with majority support in the House of Representatives forms the government and its leader becomes Prime Minister. In cases where no party has majority support, the Governor-General has the constitutional power to appoint the Prime Minister and, if necessary, dismiss one that has lost the confidence of Parliament. Due to the relatively unique position of Australia operating as a Westminster Parliamentary democracy with an elected upper house, the system has sometimes been referred to as having a "Washminster mutation", or as a Semi-parliamentary system. There are two major political groups that usually form government, federally and in the states: the Australian Labor Party and the Coalition which is a formal grouping of the Liberal Party and its minor partner, the National Party. Within Australian political culture, the Coalition is considered centre-right and the Labor Party is considered centre-left. Independent members and several minor parties have achieved representation in Australian parliaments, mostly in upper houses. The Australian Greens are often considered the "third force" in politics, being the third largest party by both vote and membership.The most recent federal election was held on 18 May 2019 and resulted in the Coalition, led by Prime Minister Scott Morrison, retaining government.Australia has six states — New South Wales (NSW), Queensland (QLD), South Australia (SA), Tasmania (TAS), Victoria (VIC) and Western Australia (WA) — and two major mainland territories—the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and the Northern Territory (NT). In most respects, these two territories function as states, except that the Commonwealth Parliament has the power to modify or repeal any legislation passed by the territory parliaments.Under the constitution, the states essentially have plenary legislative power to legislate on any subject, whereas the Commonwealth (federal) Parliament may legislate only within the subject areas enumerated under section 51. For example, state parliaments have the power to legislate with respect to education, criminal law and state police, health, transport, and local government, but the Commonwealth Parliament does not have any specific power to legislate in these areas. However, Commonwealth laws prevail over state laws to the extent of the inconsistency.Each state and major mainland territory has its own parliament — unicameral in the Northern Territory, the ACT and Queensland, and bicameral in the other states. The states are sovereign entities, although subject to certain powers of the Commonwealth as defined by the Constitution. The lower houses are known as the Legislative Assembly (the House of Assembly in South Australia and Tasmania); the upper houses are known as the Legislative Council. The head of the government in each state is the Premier and in each territory the Chief Minister. The Queen is represented in each state by a governor; and in the Northern Territory, the administrator. In the Commonwealth, the Queen's representative is the governor-general.The Commonwealth Parliament also directly administers the external territories of Ashmore and Cartier Islands, Christmas Island, the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, the Coral Sea Islands, Heard Island and McDonald Islands, and the claimed region of Australian Antarctic Territory, as well as the internal Jervis Bay Territory, a naval base and sea port for the national capital in land that was formerly part of New South Wales. The external territory of Norfolk Island previously exercised considerable autonomy under the "Norfolk Island Act 1979" through its own legislative assembly and an Administrator to represent the Queen. In 2015, the Commonwealth Parliament abolished self-government, integrating Norfolk Island into the Australian tax and welfare systems and replacing its legislative assembly with a council. Macquarie Island is part of Tasmania, and Lord Howe Island of New South Wales.Over recent decades, Australia's foreign relations have been driven by a close association with the United States through the ANZUS pact, and by a desire to develop relationships with Asia and the Pacific, particularly through Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Pacific Islands Forum and the Pacific Community, of which Australia is a founding member. In 2005, Australia secured an inaugural seat at the East Asia Summit following its accession to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, and in 2011 attended the Sixth East Asia Summit in Indonesia. Australia is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, in which the Commonwealth Heads of Government meetings provide the main forum for co-operation. Australia has pursued the cause of international trade liberalisation. It led the formation of the Cairns Group and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.Australia is a member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), and has pursued several major bilateral free trade agreements, most recently the Australia–United States Free Trade Agreement and Closer Economic Relations with New Zealand, with another free trade agreement being negotiated with China — the Australia–China Free Trade Agreement — and Japan, South Korea in 2011, Australia–Chile Free Trade Agreement, and has put the Trans-Pacific Partnership before parliament for ratification.Australia maintains a deeply integrated relationship with neighbouring New Zealand, with free mobility of citizens between the two countries under the Trans-Tasman Travel Arrangement and free trade under the Australia–New Zealand Closer Economic Relations Trade Agreement. New Zealand, Canada and the United Kingdom are the most favourably viewed countries in the world by Australian people.Along with New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Malaysia and Singapore, Australia is party to the Five Power Defence Arrangements, a regional defence agreement. A founding member country of the United Nations, Australia is strongly committed to multilateralism and maintains an international aid program under which some 60 countries receive assistance. The 2005–2006 budget provides AU$2.5 billion for development assistance. Australia ranks fifteenth overall in the Center for Global Development's 2012 Commitment to Development Index.Australia's armed forces—the Australian Defence Force (ADF) — comprise the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), the Australian Army and the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), in total numbering 81,214 personnel (including 57,982 regulars and 23,232 reservists) . The titular role of Commander-in-Chief is vested in the Governor-General, who appoints a Chief of the Defence Force from one of the armed services on the advice of the government. In a diarchy, the CDF serves as co-chairman of the Defence Committee, conjointly with the Secretary of Defence, in the command and control of the Australian Defence Organisation.In the 2016–2017 budget, defence spending comprised 2% of GDP, representing the world's 12th largest defence budget. Australia has been involved in United Nations and regional peacekeeping, disaster relief and armed conflict, including the 2003 invasion of Iraq; Australia currently has deployed about 2,241 personnel in varying capacities to 12 international operations in areas including Iraq and Afghanistan.A wealthy country, Australia has a market economy, a high GDP per capita, and a relatively low rate of poverty. In terms of average wealth, Australia ranked second in the world after Switzerland from 2013 until 2018. In 2018, Australia overtook Switzerland and became the country with the highest average wealth. Australia's relative poverty rate is 13.6%. It was identified by the Credit Suisse Research Institute as the nation with the highest median wealth in the world and the second-highest average wealth per adult in 2013.The Australian dollar is the currency for the nation, including Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and Norfolk Island, as well as the independent Pacific Island states of Kiribati, Nauru, and Tuvalu. With the 2006 merger of the Australian Stock Exchange and the Sydney Futures Exchange, the Australian Securities Exchange became the ninth largest in the world.Ranked fifth in the Index of Economic Freedom (2017), Australia is the world's 13th largest economy and has the tenth highest per capita GDP (nominal) at US$55,692. The country was ranked third in the United Nations 2017 Human Development Index. Melbourne reached top spot for the fourth year in a row on "The Economist"s 2014 list of the world's most liveable cities, followed by Adelaide, Sydney, and Perth in the fifth, seventh, and ninth places respectively. Total government debt in Australia is about A$190 billion—20% of GDP in 2010. Australia has among the highest house prices and some of the highest household debt levels in the world.An emphasis on exporting commodities rather than manufactured goods has underpinned a significant increase in Australia's terms of trade since the start of the 21st century, due to rising commodity prices. Australia has a balance of payments that is more than 7% of GDP negative, and has had persistently large current account deficits for more than 50 years. Australia has grown at an average annual rate of 3.6% for over 15 years, in comparison to the OECD annual average of 2.5%.Australia was the only advanced economy not to experience a recession due to the global financial downturn in 2008–2009. However, the economies of six of Australia's major trading partners were in recession, which in turn affected Australia, significantly hampering its economic growth. From 2012 to early 2013, Australia's national economy grew, but some non-mining states and Australia's non-mining economy experienced a recession.The Hawke Government floated the Australian dollar in 1983 and partially deregulated the financial system. The Howard Government followed with a partial deregulation of the labour market and the further privatisation of state-owned businesses, most notably in the telecommunications industry. The indirect tax system was substantially changed in July 2000 with the introduction of a 10% Goods and Services Tax (GST). In Australia's tax system, personal and company income tax are the main sources of government revenue., there were 12,640,800 people employed (either full- or part-time), with an unemployment rate of 5.2%. Data released in mid-November 2013 showed that the number of welfare recipients had grown by 55%. In 2007 228,621 Newstart unemployment allowance recipients were registered, a total that increased to 646,414 in March 2013. According to the Graduate Careers Survey, full-time employment for newly qualified professionals from various occupations has declined since 2011 but it increases for graduates three years after graduation.Access to biocapacity in Australia is much higher than world average. In 2016, Australia had 12.3 global hectares of biocapacity per person within its territory, much more than the world average of 1.6 global hectares per person. In 2016 Australia used 6.6 global hectares of biocapacity per person – their ecological footprint of consumption. This means they use half as much biocapacity as Australia contains. As a result, Australia is running a biocapacity reserve.In 2020 the Australian Council of Social Service released a report stating that relative poverty was growing in Australia, with an estimated 3.2 million people, or 13.6% of the population, living below an internationally accepted relative poverty threshold of 50% of a country's median income. It also estimated that there were 774,000 (17.7%) children under the age of 15 in relative poverty.Australia has an average population density of / 7682300 round 1 persons per square kilometre of total land area, which makes it one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world. The population is heavily concentrated on the east coast, and in particular in the south-eastern region between South East Queensland to the north-east and Adelaide to the south-west.Australia is highly urbanised, with 67% of the population living in the Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (metropolitan areas of the state and mainland territorial capital cities) in 2018. Metropolitan areas with more than one million inhabitants are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.In common with many other developed countries, Australia is experiencing a demographic shift towards an older population, with more retirees and fewer people of working age. In 2018 the average age of the Australian population was 38.8 years. In 2015, 2.15% of the Australian population lived overseas, one of the worldwide.Between 1788 and the Second World War, the vast majority of settlers and immigrants came from the British Isles (principally England, Ireland and Scotland), although there was significant immigration from China and Germany during the 19th century. In the decades immediately following the Second World War, Australia received a large wave of immigration from across Europe, with many more immigrants arriving from Southern and Eastern Europe than in previous decades. Since the end of the White Australia policy in 1973, Australia has pursued an official policy of multiculturalism, and there has been a large and continuing wave of immigration from across the world, with Asia being the largest source of immigrants in the 21st century.Today, Australia has the world's eighth-largest immigrant population, with immigrants accounting for 30% of the population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. 160,323 permanent immigrants were admitted to Australia in 2018–2019 (excluding refugees), whilst there was a net population gain of 239,600 people from all permanent and temporary immigration in that year. The majority of immigrants are skilled, but the immigration program includes categories for family members and refugees. In 2020, the largest foreign-born populations were those born in England (3.8%), India (2.8%), Mainland China (2.5%), New Zealand (2.2%), the Philippines (1.2%) and Vietnam (1.1%).In the 2016 Australian census, the most commonly nominated ancestries were: At the 2016 census, 649,171 people (2.8% of the total population) identified as being Indigenous — Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders. Indigenous Australians experience higher than average rates of imprisonment and unemployment, lower levels of education, and life expectancies for males and females that are, respectively, 11 and 17 years lower than those of non-indigenous Australians. Some remote Indigenous communities have been described as having "failed state"-like conditions.Although Australia has no official language, English is the "de facto" national language. Australian English is a major variety of the language with a distinctive accent and lexicon, and differs slightly from other varieties of English in grammar and spelling. General Australian serves as the standard dialect.According to the 2016 census, English is the only language spoken in the home for 72.7% of the population. The next most common languages spoken at home are Mandarin (2.5%), Arabic (1.4%), Cantonese (1.2%), Vietnamese (1.2%) and Italian (1.2%). Over 250 Indigenous Australian languages are thought to have existed at the time of first European contact, of which fewer than twenty are still in daily use by all age groups. About 110 others are spoken exclusively by older people. At the time of the 2006 census, 52,000 Indigenous Australians, representing 12% of the Indigenous population, reported that they spoke an Indigenous language at home. Australia has a sign language known as Auslan, which is the main language of about 10,112 deaf people who reported that they spoke Auslan language at home in the 2016 census.Australia has no state religion; Section 116 of the Australian Constitution prohibits the federal government from making any law to establish any religion, impose any religious observance, or prohibit the free exercise of any religion. In the 2016 census, 52.1% of Australians were counted as Christian, including 22.6% as Catholic and 13.3% as Anglican; 30.1% of the population reported having "no religion"; 8.2% identify with non-Christian religions, the largest of these being Islam (2.6%), followed by Buddhism (2.4%), Hinduism (1.9%), Sikhism (0.5%) and Judaism (0.4%). The remaining 9.7% of the population did not provide an adequate answer. Those who reported having no religion increased conspicuously from 19% in 2006 to 22% in 2011 to 30.1% in 2016.Before European settlement, the animist beliefs of Australia's indigenous people had been practised for many thousands of years. Mainland Aboriginal Australians' spirituality is known as the Dreaming and it places a heavy emphasis on belonging to the land. The collection of stories that it contains shaped Aboriginal law and customs. Aboriginal art, story and dance continue to draw on these spiritual traditions. The spirituality and customs of Torres Strait Islanders, who inhabit the islands between Australia and New Guinea, reflected their Melanesian origins and dependence on the sea. The 1996 Australian census counted more than 7000 respondents as followers of a traditional Aboriginal religion.Since the arrival of the First Fleet of British ships in 1788, Christianity has become the major religion practised in Australia. Christian churches have played an integral role in the development of education, health and welfare services in Australia. For much of Australian history, the Church of England (now known as the Anglican Church of Australia) was the largest religious denomination, with a large Roman Catholic minority. However, multicultural immigration has contributed to a steep decline in its relative position since the Second World War. Similarly, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism and Judaism have all grown in Australia over the past half-century.Australia has one of the lowest levels of religious adherence in the world. In 2018, 13% of women and 10% of men reported attending church at least weekly.Australia's life expectancy is the fourth highest in the world for males and the third highest for females. Life expectancy in Australia in 2014–2016 was 80.4 years for males and 84.6 years for females. Australia has the highest rates of skin cancer in the world, while cigarette smoking is the largest preventable cause of death and disease, responsible for 7.8% of the total mortality and disease. Ranked second in preventable causes is hypertension at 7.6%, with obesity third at 7.5%. Australia ranks 35th in the world and near the top of developed nations for its proportion of obese adults and nearly two thirds (63%) of its adult population is either overweight or obese.Total expenditure on health (including private sector spending) is around 9.8% of GDP. Australia introduced universal health care in 1975. Known as Medicare, it is now nominally funded by an income tax surcharge known as the Medicare levy, currently at 2%. The states manage hospitals and attached outpatient services, while the Commonwealth funds the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (subsidising the costs of medicines) and general practice.School attendance, or registration for home schooling, is compulsory throughout Australia. Education is the responsibility of the individual states and territories so the rules vary between states, but in general children are required to attend school from the age of about 5 until about 16. In some states (e.g., Western Australia, the Northern Territory and New South Wales), children aged 16–17 are required to either attend school or participate in vocational training, such as an apprenticeship.Australia has an adult literacy rate that was estimated to be 99% in 2003. However, a 2011–2012 report for the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that Tasmania has a literacy and numeracy rate of only 50%.Australia has 37 government-funded universities and three private universities, as well as a number of other specialist institutions that provide approved courses at the higher education level. The OECD places Australia among the most expensive nations to attend university. There is a state-based system of vocational training, known as TAFE, and many trades conduct apprenticeships for training new tradespeople. About 58% of Australians aged from 25 to 64 have vocational or tertiary qualifications, and the tertiary graduation rate of 49% is the highest among OECD countries. 30.9% of Australia's population has attained a higher education qualification, which is among the highest percentages in the world.Australia has the highest ratio of international students per head of population in the world by a large margin, with 812,000 international students enrolled in the nation's universities and vocational institutions in 2019. Accordingly, in 2019, international students represented on average 26.7% of the student bodies of Australian universities. International education therefore represents one of the country's largest exports and has a pronounced influence on the country's demographics, with a significant proportion of international students remaining in Australia after graduation on various skill and employment visas.In 2003, Australia's energy sources were coal (58.4%), hydropower (19.1%), natural gas (13.5%), liquid/gas fossil fuel-switching plants (5.4%), oil (2.9%), and other renewable resources like wind power, solar energy, and bioenergy (0.7%). During the 21st century, Australia has been trending to generate more energy using renewable resources and less energy using fossil fuels. In 2020, Australia used coal for 62% of all energy (3.6% increase compared to 2013), wind power for 9.9% (9.5% increase), natural gas for 9.9% (3.6% decrease), solar power for 9.9% (9.8% increase), hydropower for 6.4% (12.7% decrease), bioenergy for 1.4% (1.2% increase), and other sources like oil and waste coal mine gas for 0.5%.In August 2009, Australia's government set a goal to achieve 20% of all energy in the country from renewable sources by 2020. They achieved this goal, as renewable resources accounted for 27.7% of Australia's energy in 2020.Since 1788, the primary influence behind Australian culture has been Anglo-Celtic Western culture, with some Indigenous influences. The divergence and evolution that has occurred in the ensuing centuries has resulted in a distinctive Australian culture. The culture of the United States has served as a significant influence, particularly through television and cinema. Other cultural influences come from neighbouring Asian countries, and through large-scale immigration from non-English-speaking nations.Australia has over 100,000 Aboriginal rock art sites, and traditional designs, patterns and stories infuse contemporary Indigenous Australian art, "the last great art movement of the 20th century" according to critic Robert Hughes; its exponents include Emily Kame Kngwarreye. Early colonial artists showed a fascination with the unfamiliar land. The impressionistic works of Arthur Streeton, Tom Roberts and other members of the 19th-century Heidelberg School—the first "distinctively Australian" movement in Western art—gave expression to nationalist sentiments in the lead-up to Federation. While the school remained influential into the 1900s, modernists such as Margaret Preston, and, later, Sidney Nolan and Arthur Boyd, explored new artistic trends. The landscape remained a central subject matter for Fred Williams, Brett Whiteley and other post-war artists whose works, eclectic in style yet uniquely Australian, moved between the figurative and the abstract. The national and state galleries maintain collections of local and international art. Australia has one of the world's highest attendances of art galleries and museums per head of population.Australian literature grew slowly in the decades following European settlement though Indigenous oral traditions, many of which have since been recorded in writing, are much older. In the 1870s, Adam Lindsay Gordon posthumously became the first Australian poet to attain a wide readership. Following in his footsteps, Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson captured the experience of the bush using a distinctive Australian vocabulary. Their works are still popular; Paterson's bush poem "Waltzing Matilda" (1895) is regarded as Australia's unofficial national anthem. Miles Franklin is the namesake of Australia's most prestigious literary prize, awarded annually to the best novel about Australian life. Its first recipient, Patrick White, went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1973. Australian Booker Prize winners include Peter Carey, Thomas Keneally and Richard Flanagan. Authors David Malouf, Germaine Greer, Helen Garner, playwright David Williamson and poet Les Murray are also renowned.Many of Australia's performing arts companies receive funding through the federal government's Australia Council. There is a symphony orchestra in each state, and a national opera company, Opera Australia, well known for its famous soprano Joan Sutherland. At the beginning of the 20th century, Nellie Melba was one of the world's leading opera singers. Ballet and dance are represented by The Australian Ballet and various state companies. Each state has a publicly funded theatre company."The Story of the Kelly Gang" (1906), the world's first feature-length narrative film, spurred a boom in Australian cinema during the silent film era. After World War I, Hollywood monopolised the industry, and by the 1960s Australian film production had effectively ceased. With the benefit of government support, the Australian New Wave of the 1970s brought provocative and successful films, many exploring themes of national identity, such as "Wake in Fright" and "Gallipoli", while "Crocodile Dundee" and the Ozploitation movement's "Mad Max" series became international blockbusters. In a film market flooded with foreign content, Australian films delivered a 7.7% share of the local box office in 2015. The AACTAs are Australia's premier film and television awards, and notable Academy Award winners from Australia include Geoffrey Rush, Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett and Heath Ledger.Australia has two public broadcasters (the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the multicultural Special Broadcasting Service), three commercial television networks, several pay-TV services, and numerous public, non-profit television and radio stations. Each major city has at least one daily newspaper, and there are two national daily newspapers, "The Australian" and "The Australian Financial Review". In 2010, Reporters Without Borders placed Australia 18th on a list of 178 countries ranked by press freedom, behind New Zealand (8th) but ahead of the United Kingdom (19th) and United States (20th). This relatively low ranking is primarily because of the limited diversity of commercial media ownership in Australia; most print media are under the control of News Corporation and, after Fairfax Media was merged with Nine, Nine Entertainment Co.Most Indigenous Australian groups subsisted on a simple hunter-gatherer diet of native fauna and flora, otherwise called bush tucker. The first settlers introduced British food to the continent, much of which is now considered typical Australian food, such as the Sunday roast. Multicultural immigration transformed Australian cuisine; post-World War II European migrants, particularly from the Mediterranean, helped to build a thriving Australian coffee culture, and the influence of Asian cultures has led to Australian variants of their staple foods, such as the Chinese-inspired dim sim and Chiko Roll. Vegemite, pavlova, lamingtons and meat pies are regarded as iconic Australian foods.Australian wine is produced mainly in the southern, cooler parts of the country. Australia is also known for its cafe and coffee culture in urban centres, which has influenced coffee culture abroad, including New York City. Australia was responsible for the flat white coffee–purported to have originated in a Sydney cafe in the mid-1980s.Cricket and football are the predominate sports in Australia during the summer and winter months, respectively. Australia is unique in that it has professional leagues for four football codes. Originating in Melbourne in the 1850s, Australian rules football is the most popular code in all states except New South Wales and Queensland, where rugby league holds sway, followed by rugby union; the imaginary border separating areas where Australian rules football dominates from those were the two rugby codes prevail is known as the Barassi Line. Soccer, while ranked fourth in popularity and resources, has the highest overall participation rates. Cricket is popular across all borders and has been regarded by many Australians as the national sport. The Australian national cricket team competed against England in the first Test match (1877) and the first One Day International (1971), and against New Zealand in the first Twenty20 International (2004), winning all three games. It has also participated in every edition of the Cricket World Cup, winning the tournament a record five times.Australia is also notable for water-based sports, such as swimming and surfing. The surf lifesaving movement originated in Australia, and the volunteer lifesaver is one of the country's icons. Nationally, other popular sports include horse racing, basketball, and motor racing. The annual Melbourne Cup horse race and the Sydney to Hobart yacht race attract intense interest. In 2016, the Australian Sports Commission revealed that swimming, cycling and soccer are the three most popular participation sports.Australia is one of five nations to have participated in every Summer Olympics of the modern era, and has hosted the Games twice: 1956 in Melbourne and 2000 in Sydney. Australia has also participated in every Commonwealth Games, hosting the event in 1938, 1962, 1982, 2006 and 2018. Australia made its inaugural appearance at the Pacific Games in 2015. As well as being a regular FIFA World Cup participant, Australia has won the OFC Nations Cup four times and the AFC Asian Cup once—the only country to have won championships in two different FIFA confederations. In June 2020, Australia won its bid to co-host the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup with New Zealand. The country regularly competes among the world elite basketball teams as it is among the global top three teams in terms of qualifications to the Basketball Tournament at the Summer Olympics. Other major international events held in Australia include the Australian Open tennis grand slam tournament, international cricket matches, and the Australian Formula One Grand Prix. The highest-rating television programs include sports telecasts such as the Summer Olympics, FIFA World Cup, The Ashes, Rugby League State of Origin, and the grand finals of the National Rugby League and Australian Football League. Skiing in Australia began in the 1860s and snow sports take place in the Australian Alps and parts of Tasmania.
|
[
"Billy Hughes",
"Gough Whitlam",
"Malcolm Fraser",
"Joseph Cook",
"George Reid",
"John McEwen",
"Scott Morrison",
"Arthur Fadden",
"Malcolm Turnbull",
"Robert Menzies",
"Andrew Fisher",
"Harold Holt",
"Earle Page",
"John Howard",
"Edmund Barton",
"Frank Forde",
"Kevin Rudd",
"Tony Abbott",
"Ben Chifley",
"William McMahon",
"Paul Keating",
"Julia Gillard",
"Chris Watson",
"Anthony Albanese",
"Stanley Bruce",
"John Gorton",
"James Scullin",
"Bob Hawke",
"Alfred Deakin",
"John Curtin"
] |
|
Who was the head of Australia in 05/11/1937?
|
November 05, 1937
|
{
"text": [
"Joseph Lyons"
]
}
|
L2_Q408_P6_9
|
Arthur Fadden is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1941 to Oct, 1941.
James Scullin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1929 to Jan, 1932.
Edmund Barton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1901 to Sep, 1903.
Tony Abbott is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2013 to Sep, 2015.
Joseph Lyons is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1932 to Apr, 1939.
John McEwen is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1967 to Jan, 1968.
Alfred Deakin is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1905 to Nov, 1908.
Julia Gillard is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 2010 to Jun, 2013.
Chris Watson is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1904 to Aug, 1904.
Andrew Fisher is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1908 to Jun, 1909.
Scott Morrison is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 2018 to May, 2022.
John Gorton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1968 to Mar, 1971.
Robert Menzies is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1949 to Jan, 1966.
Frank Forde is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Jul, 1945.
Ben Chifley is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Dec, 1949.
Malcolm Turnbull is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2015 to Aug, 2018.
Bob Hawke is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1983 to Dec, 1991.
Billy Hughes is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1915 to Feb, 1923.
Joseph Cook is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 1913 to Sep, 1914.
John Howard is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1996 to Mar, 2007.
John Curtin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1941 to Jul, 1945.
Harold Holt is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1966 to Dec, 1967.
Malcolm Fraser is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1975 to Mar, 1983.
Anthony Albanese is the head of the government of Australia from May, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
Kevin Rudd is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 2007 to Jun, 2010.
George Reid is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1904 to Jul, 1905.
Stanley Bruce is the head of the government of Australia from Feb, 1923 to Oct, 1929.
Paul Keating is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1991 to Mar, 1996.
Gough Whitlam is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1972 to Nov, 1975.
William McMahon is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1971 to Dec, 1972.
Earle Page is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1939 to Apr, 1939.
|
AustraliaAustralia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia's population of nearly / 1000000 round 0 million, in an area of , is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Canberra is the nation's capital, while the largest city is Sydney, and other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide.Indigenous Australians inhabited the continent for about 65,000 years, prior to the first arrival of Dutch explorers in the early 17th century, who named it New Holland. In 1770, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain and initially settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788, a date which became Australia's national day. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the time of an 1850s gold rush, most of the continent had been explored by European settlers and an additional five self-governing crown colonies established. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy, comprising six states and ten territories.Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, and mountain ranges in the south-east. Australia generates its income from various sources, including mining-related exports, telecommunications, banking, manufacturing, and international education.Australia is a highly developed country, with the world's twelfth-largest economy. It has a high-income economy, with the world's tenth-highest per capita income. Australia is a regional power, and has the world's thirteenth-highest military expenditure. Immigrants account for 30% of the country's population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. Having the eight-highest Human Development Index, and the ninth-highest ranked democracy globally as of 2020, Australia ranks highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom, civil liberties, and political rights, with all its major cities faring exceptionally in global comparative livability surveys. It is a member of the United Nations, the G20, the Commonwealth of Nations, the ANZUS, the OECD, the WTO, the APEC, the Pacific Islands Forum, the Pacific Community and the ASEAN + 6 mechanism.The name "Australia" (pronounced in Australian English) is derived from the Latin "Terra Australis" ("southern land"), a name used for a hypothetical continent in the Southern Hemisphere since ancient times. When Europeans first began visiting and mapping Australia in the 17th century, the name "Terra Australis" was naturally applied to the new territories.Until the early 19th century, Australia was best known as "New Holland", a name first applied by the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in 1644 (as "Nieuw-Holland") and subsequently anglicised. "Terra Australis" still saw occasional usage, such as in scientific texts. The name "Australia" was popularised by the explorer Matthew Flinders, who said it was "more agreeable to the ear, and an assimilation to the names of the other great portions of the Earth". Several famous early cartographers also made use of the word Australia on maps. Gerardus Mercator used the phrase "climata " on his double cordiform map of the world of 1538, as did Gemma Frisius, who was Mercator's teacher and collaborator, on his own cordiform wall map in 1540. Australia appears in a book on astronomy by Cyriaco Jacob zum Barth published in Frankfurt am Main in 1545.The first time that "Australia" appears to have been officially used was in April 1817, when Governor Lachlan Macquarie acknowledged the receipt of Flinders' charts of Australia from Lord Bathurst. In December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted. In 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially by that name. The first official published use of the new name came with the publication in 1830 of "The Australia Directory" by the Hydrographic Office.Colloquial names for Australia include "Oz" and "the Land Down Under" (usually shortened to just "Down Under"). Other epithets include "the Great Southern Land", "the Lucky Country", "the Sunburnt Country", and "the Wide Brown Land". The latter two both derive from Dorothea Mackellar's 1908 poem "My Country".Human habitation of the Australian continent is known to have begun at least 65,000 years ago, with the migration of people by land bridges and short sea-crossings from what is now Southeast Asia. The Madjedbebe rock shelter in Arnhem Land is recognised as the oldest site showing the presence of humans in Australia. The oldest human remains found are the Lake Mungo remains, which have been dated to around 41,000 years ago. These people were the ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. Aboriginal Australian culture is one of the oldest continual cultures on Earth.At the time of first European contact, most Indigenous Australians were hunter-gatherers with complex economies and societies. Recent archaeological finds suggest that a population of 750,000 could have been sustained. Indigenous Australians have an oral culture with spiritual values based on reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, obtained their livelihood from seasonal horticulture and the resources of their reefs and seas. The northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by Makassan fishermen from what is now Indonesia.The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the "Duyfken" captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, and made landfall on 26 February 1606 at the Pennefather River near the modern town of Weipa on Cape York. Later that year, Spanish explorer Luís Vaz de Torres sailed through, and navigated, Torres Strait islands. The Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent "New Holland" during the 17th century, and although no attempt at settlement was made, a number of shipwrecks left men either stranded or, as in the case of the "Batavia" in 1629, marooned for mutiny and murder, thus becoming the first Europeans to permanently inhabit the continent. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688 (while serving as a crewman under pirate Captain John Read) and again in 1699 on a return trip. In 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain.With the loss of its American colonies in 1783, the British Government sent a fleet of ships, the "First Fleet", under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip, to establish a new penal colony in New South Wales. A camp was set up and the Union flag raised at Sydney Cove, Port Jackson, on 26 January 1788, a date which later became Australia's national day, Australia Day. Most early convicts were transported for petty crimes and assigned as labourers or servants upon arrival. While the majority settled into colonial society once emancipated, convict rebellions and uprisings were also staged, but invariably suppressed under martial law. The 1808 Rum Rebellion, the only successful armed takeover of government in Australia, instigated a two-year period of military rule.The indigenous population declined for 150 years following settlement, mainly due to infectious disease. Thousands more died as a result of frontier conflict with settlers. A government policy of "assimilation" beginning with the "Aboriginal Protection Act 1869" resulted in the removal of many Aboriginal children from their families and communities—referred to as the Stolen Generations — a practice which also contributed to the decline in the indigenous population. As a result of the 1967 referendum, the Federal government's power to enact special laws with respect to a particular race was extended to enable the making of laws with respect to Aboriginals. Traditional ownership of land ("native title") was not recognised in law until 1992, when the High Court of Australia held in "Mabo v Queensland (No 2)" that the legal doctrine that Australia had been "terra nullius" ("land belonging to no one") did not apply to Australia at the time of British settlement.The expansion of British control over other areas of the continent began in the early 19th century, initially confined to coastal regions. A settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land (present-day Tasmania) in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. In 1813, Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Wentworth crossed the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, opening the interior to European settlement. The British claim was extended to the whole Australian continent in 1827 when Major Edmund Lockyer established a settlement on King George Sound (modern-day Albany). The Swan River Colony (present-day Perth) was established in 1829, evolving into the largest Australian colony by area, Western Australia. In accordance with population growth, separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales: South Australia in 1836, New Zealand in 1841, Victoria in 1851, and Queensland in 1859. The Northern Territory was excised from South Australia in 1911. South Australia was founded as a "free province" — it was never a penal colony. Western Australia was also founded "free" but later accepted transported convicts, the last of which arrived in 1868, decades after transportation had ceased to the other colonies. In the mid-19th century, explorers such as Burke and Wills went further inland to determine its agricultural potential and answer scientific questions.A series of gold rushes beginning in the early 1850s led to an influx of new migrants from China, North America and continental Europe, and also spurred outbreaks of bushranging and civil unrest; the latter peaked in 1854 when Ballarat miners launched the Eureka Rebellion against gold license fees. Between 1855 and 1890, the six colonies individually gained responsible government, managing most of their own affairs while remaining part of the British Empire. The Colonial Office in London retained control of some matters, notably foreign affairs and defence.On 1 January 1901, federation of the colonies was achieved after a decade of planning, consultation and voting. After the 1907 Imperial Conference, Australia and the other self-governing British colonies were given the status of "dominion" within the British Empire. The Federal Capital Territory (later renamed the Australian Capital Territory) was formed in 1911 as the location for the future federal capital of Canberra. Melbourne was the temporary seat of government from 1901 to 1927 while Canberra was being constructed. The Northern Territory was transferred from the control of the South Australian government to the federal parliament in 1911. Australia became the colonial ruler of the Territory of Papua (which had initially been annexed by Queensland in 1883) in 1902 and of the Territory of New Guinea (formerly German New Guinea) in 1920. The two were unified as the Territory of Papua and New Guinea in 1949 and gained independence from Australia in 1975.In 1914, Australia joined Britain in fighting World War I, with support from both the outgoing Commonwealth Liberal Party and the incoming Australian Labor Party. Australians took part in many of the major battles fought on the Western Front. Of about 416,000 who served, about 60,000 were killed and another 152,000 were wounded. Many Australians regard the defeat of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs) at Gallipoli as the birth of the nation — its first major military action. The Kokoda Track campaign is regarded by many as an analogous nation-defining event during World War II.Britain's Statute of Westminster 1931 formally ended most of the constitutional links between Australia and the United Kingdom. Australia adopted it in 1942, but it was backdated to 1939 to confirm the validity of legislation passed by the Australian Parliament during World War II. The shock of Britain's defeat in Asia in 1942, followed soon after by the bombing of Darwin and other Japanese attacks, led to a widespread belief in Australia that an invasion was imminent, and a shift towards the United States as a new ally and protector. Since 1951, Australia has been a formal military ally of the United States, under the ANZUS treaty.After World War II, Australia encouraged immigration from mainland Europe. Since the 1970s and following the abolition of the White Australia policy, immigration from Asia and elsewhere was also promoted. As a result, Australia's demography, culture, and self-image were transformed. The "Australia Act 1986" severed the remaining constitutional ties between Australia and the United Kingdom. In a 1999 referendum, 55% of voters and a majority in every state rejected a proposal to become a republic with a president appointed by a two-thirds vote in both Houses of the Australian Parliament. There has been an increasing focus in foreign policy on ties with other Pacific Rim nations while maintaining close ties with Australia's traditional allies and trading partners.Surrounded by the Indian and Pacific oceans, Australia is separated from Asia by the Arafura and Timor seas, with the Coral Sea lying off the Queensland coast, and the Tasman Sea lying between Australia and New Zealand. The world's smallest continent and sixth largest country by total area, Australia—owing to its size and isolation—is often dubbed the "island continent" and is sometimes considered the world's largest island. Australia has of coastline (excluding all offshore islands), and claims an extensive Exclusive Economic Zone of . This exclusive economic zone does not include the Australian Antarctic Territory.Mainland Australia lies between latitudes 9° and 44° South, and longitudes 112° and 154° East. Australia's size gives it a wide variety of landscapes, with tropical rainforests in the north-east, mountain ranges in the south-east, south-west and east, and desert in the centre. The desert or semi-arid land commonly known as the outback makes up by far the largest portion of land. Australia is the driest inhabited continent; its annual rainfall averaged over continental area is less than 500 mm. The population density is 3.2 inhabitants per square kilometre, although a large proportion of the population lives along the temperate south-eastern coastline.The Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest coral reef, lies a short distance off the north-east coast and extends for over . Mount Augustus, claimed to be the world's largest monolith, is located in Western Australia. At , Mount Kosciuszko is the highest mountain on the Australian mainland. Even taller are Mawson Peak (at ), on the remote Australian external territory of Heard Island, and, in the Australian Antarctic Territory, Mount McClintock and Mount Menzies, at and respectively.Eastern Australia is marked by the Great Dividing Range, which runs parallel to the coast of Queensland, New South Wales and much of Victoria. The name is not strictly accurate, because parts of the range consist of low hills, and the highlands are typically no more than in height. The coastal uplands and a belt of Brigalow grasslands lie between the coast and the mountains, while inland of the dividing range are large areas of grassland and shrubland. These include the western plains of New South Wales, and the Mitchell Grass Downs and Mulga Lands of inland Queensland. The northernmost point of the mainland is the tropical Cape York Peninsula.The landscapes of the Top End and the Gulf Country—with their tropical climate—include forest, woodland, wetland, grassland, rainforest and desert. At the north-west corner of the continent are the sandstone cliffs and gorges of The Kimberley, and below that the Pilbara. The Victoria Plains tropical savanna lies south of the Kimberly and Arnhem Land savannas, forming a transition between the coastal savannas and the interior deserts. At the heart of the country are the uplands of central Australia. Prominent features of the centre and south include Uluru (also known as Ayers Rock), the famous sandstone monolith, and the inland Simpson, Tirari and Sturt Stony, Gibson, Great Sandy, Tanami, and Great Victoria deserts, with the famous Nullarbor Plain on the southern coast. The Western Australian mulga shrublands lie between the interior deserts and Mediterranean-climate Southwest Australia.Lying on the Indo-Australian Plate, the mainland of Australia is the lowest and most primordial landmass on Earth with a relatively stable geological history. The landmass includes virtually all known rock types and from all geological time periods spanning over 3.8 billion years of the Earth's history. The Pilbara Craton is one of only two pristine Archaean 3.6–2.7 Ga (billion years ago) crusts identified on the Earth.Having been part of all major supercontinents, the Australian continent began to form after the breakup of Gondwana in the Permian, with the separation of the continental landmass from the African continent and Indian subcontinent. It separated from Antarctica over a prolonged period beginning in the Permian and continuing through to the Cretaceous. When the last glacial period ended in about 10,000 BC, rising sea levels formed Bass Strait, separating Tasmania from the mainland. Then between about 8,000 and 6,500 BC, the lowlands in the north were flooded by the sea, separating New Guinea, the Aru Islands, and the mainland of Australia. The Australian continent is moving toward Eurasia at the rate of 6 to 7 centimetres a year.The Australian mainland's continental crust, excluding the thinned margins, has an average thickness of 38km, with a range in thickness from 24 km to 59 km. Australia's geology can be divided into several main sections, showcasing that the continent grew from west to east: the Archaean cratonic shields found mostly in the west, Proterozoic fold belts in the centre and Phanerozoic sedimentary basins, metamorphic and igneous rocks in the east.The Australian mainland and Tasmania are situated in the middle of the tectonic plate and have no active volcanoes, but due to passing over the East Australia hotspot, recent volcanism has occurred during the Holocene, in the Newer Volcanics Province of western Victoria and southeastern South Australia. Volcanism also occurs in the island of New Guinea (considered geologically as part of the Australian continent), and in the Australian external territory of Heard Island and McDonald Islands. Seismic activity in the Australian mainland and Tasmania is also low, with the greatest number of fatalities having occurred in the 1989 Newcastle earthquake.The climate of Australia is significantly influenced by ocean currents, including the Indian Ocean Dipole and the El Niño–Southern Oscillation, which is correlated with periodic drought, and the seasonal tropical low-pressure system that produces cyclones in northern Australia. These factors cause rainfall to vary markedly from year to year. Much of the northern part of the country has a tropical, predominantly summer-rainfall (monsoon). The south-west corner of the country has a Mediterranean climate. The south-east ranges from oceanic (Tasmania and coastal Victoria) to humid subtropical (upper half of New South Wales), with the highlands featuring alpine and subpolar oceanic climates. The interior is arid to semi-arid.Driven by climate change, average temperatures have risen more than 1°C since 1960. Associated changes in rainfall patterns and climate extremes exacerbate existing issues such as drought and bushfires. 2019 was Australia's warmest recorded year, and the 2019–2020 bushfire season was the country's worst on record. Australia's greenhouse gas emissions per capita are among the highest in the world.Water restrictions are frequently in place in many regions and cities of Australia in response to chronic shortages due to urban population increases and localised drought. Throughout much of the continent, major flooding regularly follows extended periods of drought, flushing out inland river systems, overflowing dams and inundating large inland flood plains, as occurred throughout Eastern Australia in the early 2010s after the 2000s Australian drought.Although most of Australia is semi-arid or desert, the continent includes a diverse range of habitats from alpine heaths to tropical rainforests. Fungi typify that diversity—an estimated 250,000 species—of which only 5% have been described—occur in Australia. Because of the continent's great age, extremely variable weather patterns, and long-term geographic isolation, much of Australia's biota is unique. About 85% of flowering plants, 84% of mammals, more than 45% of birds, and 89% of in-shore, temperate-zone fish are endemic. Australia has at least 755 species of reptile, more than any other country in the world. Besides Antarctica, Australia is the only continent that developed without feline species. Feral cats may have been introduced in the 17th century by Dutch shipwrecks, and later in the 18th century by European settlers. They are now considered a major factor in the decline and extinction of many vulnerable and endangered native species. Australia is also one of 17 megadiverse countries.Australian forests are mostly made up of evergreen species, particularly eucalyptus trees in the less arid regions; wattles replace them as the dominant species in drier regions and deserts. Among well-known Australian animals are the monotremes (the platypus and echidna); a host of marsupials, including the kangaroo, koala, and wombat, and birds such as the emu and the kookaburra. Australia is home to many dangerous animals including some of the most venomous snakes in the world. The dingo was introduced by Austronesian people who traded with Indigenous Australians around 3000 BCE. Many animal and plant species became extinct soon after first human settlement, including the Australian megafauna; others have disappeared since European settlement, among them the thylacine.Many of Australia's ecoregions, and the species within those regions, are threatened by human activities and introduced animal, chromistan, fungal and plant species. All these factors have led to Australia's having the highest mammal extinction rate of any country in the world. The federal "Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999" is the legal framework for the protection of threatened species. Numerous protected areas have been created under the National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia's Biological Diversity to protect and preserve unique ecosystems; 65 wetlands are listed under the Ramsar Convention, and 16 natural World Heritage Sites have been established. Australia was ranked 21st out of 178 countries in the world on the 2018 Environmental Performance Index. There are more than 1,800 animals and plants on Australia's threatened species list, including more than 500 animals.Australia is a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy. The country has maintained a stable liberal democratic political system under its constitution, which is one of the world's oldest, since Federation in 1901. It is also one of the world's oldest federations, in which power is divided between the federal and state and territorial governments. The Australian system of government combines elements derived from the political systems of the United Kingdom (a fused executive, constitutional monarchy and strong party discipline) and the United States (federalism, a written constitution and strong bicameralism with an elected upper house), along with distinctive indigenous features.The federal government is separated into three branches:Elizabeth II reigns as Queen of Australia and is represented in Australia by the governor-general at the federal level and by the governors at the state level, who by convention act on the advice of her ministers. Thus, in practice the governor-general acts as a legal figurehead for the actions of the prime minister and the Federal Executive Council. The governor-general does have extraordinary reserve powers which may be exercised outside the prime minister's request in rare and limited circumstances, the most notable exercise of which was the dismissal of the Whitlam Government in the constitutional crisis of 1975.In the Senate (the upper house), there are 76 senators: twelve each from the states and two each from the mainland territories (the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory). The House of Representatives (the lower house) has 151 members elected from single-member electoral divisions, commonly known as "electorates" or "seats", allocated to states on the basis of population, with each original state guaranteed a minimum of five seats. Elections for both chambers are normally held every three years simultaneously; senators have overlapping six-year terms except for those from the territories, whose terms are not fixed but are tied to the electoral cycle for the lower house; thus only 40 of the 76 places in the Senate are put to each election unless the cycle is interrupted by a double dissolution.Australia's electoral system uses preferential voting for all lower house elections with the exception of Tasmania and the ACT which, along with the Senate and most state upper houses, combine it with proportional representation in a system known as the single transferable vote. Voting is compulsory for all enrolled citizens 18 years and over in every jurisdiction, as is enrolment. The party with majority support in the House of Representatives forms the government and its leader becomes Prime Minister. In cases where no party has majority support, the Governor-General has the constitutional power to appoint the Prime Minister and, if necessary, dismiss one that has lost the confidence of Parliament. Due to the relatively unique position of Australia operating as a Westminster Parliamentary democracy with an elected upper house, the system has sometimes been referred to as having a "Washminster mutation", or as a Semi-parliamentary system. There are two major political groups that usually form government, federally and in the states: the Australian Labor Party and the Coalition which is a formal grouping of the Liberal Party and its minor partner, the National Party. Within Australian political culture, the Coalition is considered centre-right and the Labor Party is considered centre-left. Independent members and several minor parties have achieved representation in Australian parliaments, mostly in upper houses. The Australian Greens are often considered the "third force" in politics, being the third largest party by both vote and membership.The most recent federal election was held on 18 May 2019 and resulted in the Coalition, led by Prime Minister Scott Morrison, retaining government.Australia has six states — New South Wales (NSW), Queensland (QLD), South Australia (SA), Tasmania (TAS), Victoria (VIC) and Western Australia (WA) — and two major mainland territories—the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and the Northern Territory (NT). In most respects, these two territories function as states, except that the Commonwealth Parliament has the power to modify or repeal any legislation passed by the territory parliaments.Under the constitution, the states essentially have plenary legislative power to legislate on any subject, whereas the Commonwealth (federal) Parliament may legislate only within the subject areas enumerated under section 51. For example, state parliaments have the power to legislate with respect to education, criminal law and state police, health, transport, and local government, but the Commonwealth Parliament does not have any specific power to legislate in these areas. However, Commonwealth laws prevail over state laws to the extent of the inconsistency.Each state and major mainland territory has its own parliament — unicameral in the Northern Territory, the ACT and Queensland, and bicameral in the other states. The states are sovereign entities, although subject to certain powers of the Commonwealth as defined by the Constitution. The lower houses are known as the Legislative Assembly (the House of Assembly in South Australia and Tasmania); the upper houses are known as the Legislative Council. The head of the government in each state is the Premier and in each territory the Chief Minister. The Queen is represented in each state by a governor; and in the Northern Territory, the administrator. In the Commonwealth, the Queen's representative is the governor-general.The Commonwealth Parliament also directly administers the external territories of Ashmore and Cartier Islands, Christmas Island, the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, the Coral Sea Islands, Heard Island and McDonald Islands, and the claimed region of Australian Antarctic Territory, as well as the internal Jervis Bay Territory, a naval base and sea port for the national capital in land that was formerly part of New South Wales. The external territory of Norfolk Island previously exercised considerable autonomy under the "Norfolk Island Act 1979" through its own legislative assembly and an Administrator to represent the Queen. In 2015, the Commonwealth Parliament abolished self-government, integrating Norfolk Island into the Australian tax and welfare systems and replacing its legislative assembly with a council. Macquarie Island is part of Tasmania, and Lord Howe Island of New South Wales.Over recent decades, Australia's foreign relations have been driven by a close association with the United States through the ANZUS pact, and by a desire to develop relationships with Asia and the Pacific, particularly through Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Pacific Islands Forum and the Pacific Community, of which Australia is a founding member. In 2005, Australia secured an inaugural seat at the East Asia Summit following its accession to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, and in 2011 attended the Sixth East Asia Summit in Indonesia. Australia is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, in which the Commonwealth Heads of Government meetings provide the main forum for co-operation. Australia has pursued the cause of international trade liberalisation. It led the formation of the Cairns Group and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.Australia is a member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), and has pursued several major bilateral free trade agreements, most recently the Australia–United States Free Trade Agreement and Closer Economic Relations with New Zealand, with another free trade agreement being negotiated with China — the Australia–China Free Trade Agreement — and Japan, South Korea in 2011, Australia–Chile Free Trade Agreement, and has put the Trans-Pacific Partnership before parliament for ratification.Australia maintains a deeply integrated relationship with neighbouring New Zealand, with free mobility of citizens between the two countries under the Trans-Tasman Travel Arrangement and free trade under the Australia–New Zealand Closer Economic Relations Trade Agreement. New Zealand, Canada and the United Kingdom are the most favourably viewed countries in the world by Australian people.Along with New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Malaysia and Singapore, Australia is party to the Five Power Defence Arrangements, a regional defence agreement. A founding member country of the United Nations, Australia is strongly committed to multilateralism and maintains an international aid program under which some 60 countries receive assistance. The 2005–2006 budget provides AU$2.5 billion for development assistance. Australia ranks fifteenth overall in the Center for Global Development's 2012 Commitment to Development Index.Australia's armed forces—the Australian Defence Force (ADF) — comprise the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), the Australian Army and the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), in total numbering 81,214 personnel (including 57,982 regulars and 23,232 reservists) . The titular role of Commander-in-Chief is vested in the Governor-General, who appoints a Chief of the Defence Force from one of the armed services on the advice of the government. In a diarchy, the CDF serves as co-chairman of the Defence Committee, conjointly with the Secretary of Defence, in the command and control of the Australian Defence Organisation.In the 2016–2017 budget, defence spending comprised 2% of GDP, representing the world's 12th largest defence budget. Australia has been involved in United Nations and regional peacekeeping, disaster relief and armed conflict, including the 2003 invasion of Iraq; Australia currently has deployed about 2,241 personnel in varying capacities to 12 international operations in areas including Iraq and Afghanistan.A wealthy country, Australia has a market economy, a high GDP per capita, and a relatively low rate of poverty. In terms of average wealth, Australia ranked second in the world after Switzerland from 2013 until 2018. In 2018, Australia overtook Switzerland and became the country with the highest average wealth. Australia's relative poverty rate is 13.6%. It was identified by the Credit Suisse Research Institute as the nation with the highest median wealth in the world and the second-highest average wealth per adult in 2013.The Australian dollar is the currency for the nation, including Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and Norfolk Island, as well as the independent Pacific Island states of Kiribati, Nauru, and Tuvalu. With the 2006 merger of the Australian Stock Exchange and the Sydney Futures Exchange, the Australian Securities Exchange became the ninth largest in the world.Ranked fifth in the Index of Economic Freedom (2017), Australia is the world's 13th largest economy and has the tenth highest per capita GDP (nominal) at US$55,692. The country was ranked third in the United Nations 2017 Human Development Index. Melbourne reached top spot for the fourth year in a row on "The Economist"s 2014 list of the world's most liveable cities, followed by Adelaide, Sydney, and Perth in the fifth, seventh, and ninth places respectively. Total government debt in Australia is about A$190 billion—20% of GDP in 2010. Australia has among the highest house prices and some of the highest household debt levels in the world.An emphasis on exporting commodities rather than manufactured goods has underpinned a significant increase in Australia's terms of trade since the start of the 21st century, due to rising commodity prices. Australia has a balance of payments that is more than 7% of GDP negative, and has had persistently large current account deficits for more than 50 years. Australia has grown at an average annual rate of 3.6% for over 15 years, in comparison to the OECD annual average of 2.5%.Australia was the only advanced economy not to experience a recession due to the global financial downturn in 2008–2009. However, the economies of six of Australia's major trading partners were in recession, which in turn affected Australia, significantly hampering its economic growth. From 2012 to early 2013, Australia's national economy grew, but some non-mining states and Australia's non-mining economy experienced a recession.The Hawke Government floated the Australian dollar in 1983 and partially deregulated the financial system. The Howard Government followed with a partial deregulation of the labour market and the further privatisation of state-owned businesses, most notably in the telecommunications industry. The indirect tax system was substantially changed in July 2000 with the introduction of a 10% Goods and Services Tax (GST). In Australia's tax system, personal and company income tax are the main sources of government revenue., there were 12,640,800 people employed (either full- or part-time), with an unemployment rate of 5.2%. Data released in mid-November 2013 showed that the number of welfare recipients had grown by 55%. In 2007 228,621 Newstart unemployment allowance recipients were registered, a total that increased to 646,414 in March 2013. According to the Graduate Careers Survey, full-time employment for newly qualified professionals from various occupations has declined since 2011 but it increases for graduates three years after graduation.Access to biocapacity in Australia is much higher than world average. In 2016, Australia had 12.3 global hectares of biocapacity per person within its territory, much more than the world average of 1.6 global hectares per person. In 2016 Australia used 6.6 global hectares of biocapacity per person – their ecological footprint of consumption. This means they use half as much biocapacity as Australia contains. As a result, Australia is running a biocapacity reserve.In 2020 the Australian Council of Social Service released a report stating that relative poverty was growing in Australia, with an estimated 3.2 million people, or 13.6% of the population, living below an internationally accepted relative poverty threshold of 50% of a country's median income. It also estimated that there were 774,000 (17.7%) children under the age of 15 in relative poverty.Australia has an average population density of / 7682300 round 1 persons per square kilometre of total land area, which makes it one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world. The population is heavily concentrated on the east coast, and in particular in the south-eastern region between South East Queensland to the north-east and Adelaide to the south-west.Australia is highly urbanised, with 67% of the population living in the Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (metropolitan areas of the state and mainland territorial capital cities) in 2018. Metropolitan areas with more than one million inhabitants are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.In common with many other developed countries, Australia is experiencing a demographic shift towards an older population, with more retirees and fewer people of working age. In 2018 the average age of the Australian population was 38.8 years. In 2015, 2.15% of the Australian population lived overseas, one of the worldwide.Between 1788 and the Second World War, the vast majority of settlers and immigrants came from the British Isles (principally England, Ireland and Scotland), although there was significant immigration from China and Germany during the 19th century. In the decades immediately following the Second World War, Australia received a large wave of immigration from across Europe, with many more immigrants arriving from Southern and Eastern Europe than in previous decades. Since the end of the White Australia policy in 1973, Australia has pursued an official policy of multiculturalism, and there has been a large and continuing wave of immigration from across the world, with Asia being the largest source of immigrants in the 21st century.Today, Australia has the world's eighth-largest immigrant population, with immigrants accounting for 30% of the population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. 160,323 permanent immigrants were admitted to Australia in 2018–2019 (excluding refugees), whilst there was a net population gain of 239,600 people from all permanent and temporary immigration in that year. The majority of immigrants are skilled, but the immigration program includes categories for family members and refugees. In 2020, the largest foreign-born populations were those born in England (3.8%), India (2.8%), Mainland China (2.5%), New Zealand (2.2%), the Philippines (1.2%) and Vietnam (1.1%).In the 2016 Australian census, the most commonly nominated ancestries were: At the 2016 census, 649,171 people (2.8% of the total population) identified as being Indigenous — Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders. Indigenous Australians experience higher than average rates of imprisonment and unemployment, lower levels of education, and life expectancies for males and females that are, respectively, 11 and 17 years lower than those of non-indigenous Australians. Some remote Indigenous communities have been described as having "failed state"-like conditions.Although Australia has no official language, English is the "de facto" national language. Australian English is a major variety of the language with a distinctive accent and lexicon, and differs slightly from other varieties of English in grammar and spelling. General Australian serves as the standard dialect.According to the 2016 census, English is the only language spoken in the home for 72.7% of the population. The next most common languages spoken at home are Mandarin (2.5%), Arabic (1.4%), Cantonese (1.2%), Vietnamese (1.2%) and Italian (1.2%). Over 250 Indigenous Australian languages are thought to have existed at the time of first European contact, of which fewer than twenty are still in daily use by all age groups. About 110 others are spoken exclusively by older people. At the time of the 2006 census, 52,000 Indigenous Australians, representing 12% of the Indigenous population, reported that they spoke an Indigenous language at home. Australia has a sign language known as Auslan, which is the main language of about 10,112 deaf people who reported that they spoke Auslan language at home in the 2016 census.Australia has no state religion; Section 116 of the Australian Constitution prohibits the federal government from making any law to establish any religion, impose any religious observance, or prohibit the free exercise of any religion. In the 2016 census, 52.1% of Australians were counted as Christian, including 22.6% as Catholic and 13.3% as Anglican; 30.1% of the population reported having "no religion"; 8.2% identify with non-Christian religions, the largest of these being Islam (2.6%), followed by Buddhism (2.4%), Hinduism (1.9%), Sikhism (0.5%) and Judaism (0.4%). The remaining 9.7% of the population did not provide an adequate answer. Those who reported having no religion increased conspicuously from 19% in 2006 to 22% in 2011 to 30.1% in 2016.Before European settlement, the animist beliefs of Australia's indigenous people had been practised for many thousands of years. Mainland Aboriginal Australians' spirituality is known as the Dreaming and it places a heavy emphasis on belonging to the land. The collection of stories that it contains shaped Aboriginal law and customs. Aboriginal art, story and dance continue to draw on these spiritual traditions. The spirituality and customs of Torres Strait Islanders, who inhabit the islands between Australia and New Guinea, reflected their Melanesian origins and dependence on the sea. The 1996 Australian census counted more than 7000 respondents as followers of a traditional Aboriginal religion.Since the arrival of the First Fleet of British ships in 1788, Christianity has become the major religion practised in Australia. Christian churches have played an integral role in the development of education, health and welfare services in Australia. For much of Australian history, the Church of England (now known as the Anglican Church of Australia) was the largest religious denomination, with a large Roman Catholic minority. However, multicultural immigration has contributed to a steep decline in its relative position since the Second World War. Similarly, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism and Judaism have all grown in Australia over the past half-century.Australia has one of the lowest levels of religious adherence in the world. In 2018, 13% of women and 10% of men reported attending church at least weekly.Australia's life expectancy is the fourth highest in the world for males and the third highest for females. Life expectancy in Australia in 2014–2016 was 80.4 years for males and 84.6 years for females. Australia has the highest rates of skin cancer in the world, while cigarette smoking is the largest preventable cause of death and disease, responsible for 7.8% of the total mortality and disease. Ranked second in preventable causes is hypertension at 7.6%, with obesity third at 7.5%. Australia ranks 35th in the world and near the top of developed nations for its proportion of obese adults and nearly two thirds (63%) of its adult population is either overweight or obese.Total expenditure on health (including private sector spending) is around 9.8% of GDP. Australia introduced universal health care in 1975. Known as Medicare, it is now nominally funded by an income tax surcharge known as the Medicare levy, currently at 2%. The states manage hospitals and attached outpatient services, while the Commonwealth funds the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (subsidising the costs of medicines) and general practice.School attendance, or registration for home schooling, is compulsory throughout Australia. Education is the responsibility of the individual states and territories so the rules vary between states, but in general children are required to attend school from the age of about 5 until about 16. In some states (e.g., Western Australia, the Northern Territory and New South Wales), children aged 16–17 are required to either attend school or participate in vocational training, such as an apprenticeship.Australia has an adult literacy rate that was estimated to be 99% in 2003. However, a 2011–2012 report for the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that Tasmania has a literacy and numeracy rate of only 50%.Australia has 37 government-funded universities and three private universities, as well as a number of other specialist institutions that provide approved courses at the higher education level. The OECD places Australia among the most expensive nations to attend university. There is a state-based system of vocational training, known as TAFE, and many trades conduct apprenticeships for training new tradespeople. About 58% of Australians aged from 25 to 64 have vocational or tertiary qualifications, and the tertiary graduation rate of 49% is the highest among OECD countries. 30.9% of Australia's population has attained a higher education qualification, which is among the highest percentages in the world.Australia has the highest ratio of international students per head of population in the world by a large margin, with 812,000 international students enrolled in the nation's universities and vocational institutions in 2019. Accordingly, in 2019, international students represented on average 26.7% of the student bodies of Australian universities. International education therefore represents one of the country's largest exports and has a pronounced influence on the country's demographics, with a significant proportion of international students remaining in Australia after graduation on various skill and employment visas.In 2003, Australia's energy sources were coal (58.4%), hydropower (19.1%), natural gas (13.5%), liquid/gas fossil fuel-switching plants (5.4%), oil (2.9%), and other renewable resources like wind power, solar energy, and bioenergy (0.7%). During the 21st century, Australia has been trending to generate more energy using renewable resources and less energy using fossil fuels. In 2020, Australia used coal for 62% of all energy (3.6% increase compared to 2013), wind power for 9.9% (9.5% increase), natural gas for 9.9% (3.6% decrease), solar power for 9.9% (9.8% increase), hydropower for 6.4% (12.7% decrease), bioenergy for 1.4% (1.2% increase), and other sources like oil and waste coal mine gas for 0.5%.In August 2009, Australia's government set a goal to achieve 20% of all energy in the country from renewable sources by 2020. They achieved this goal, as renewable resources accounted for 27.7% of Australia's energy in 2020.Since 1788, the primary influence behind Australian culture has been Anglo-Celtic Western culture, with some Indigenous influences. The divergence and evolution that has occurred in the ensuing centuries has resulted in a distinctive Australian culture. The culture of the United States has served as a significant influence, particularly through television and cinema. Other cultural influences come from neighbouring Asian countries, and through large-scale immigration from non-English-speaking nations.Australia has over 100,000 Aboriginal rock art sites, and traditional designs, patterns and stories infuse contemporary Indigenous Australian art, "the last great art movement of the 20th century" according to critic Robert Hughes; its exponents include Emily Kame Kngwarreye. Early colonial artists showed a fascination with the unfamiliar land. The impressionistic works of Arthur Streeton, Tom Roberts and other members of the 19th-century Heidelberg School—the first "distinctively Australian" movement in Western art—gave expression to nationalist sentiments in the lead-up to Federation. While the school remained influential into the 1900s, modernists such as Margaret Preston, and, later, Sidney Nolan and Arthur Boyd, explored new artistic trends. The landscape remained a central subject matter for Fred Williams, Brett Whiteley and other post-war artists whose works, eclectic in style yet uniquely Australian, moved between the figurative and the abstract. The national and state galleries maintain collections of local and international art. Australia has one of the world's highest attendances of art galleries and museums per head of population.Australian literature grew slowly in the decades following European settlement though Indigenous oral traditions, many of which have since been recorded in writing, are much older. In the 1870s, Adam Lindsay Gordon posthumously became the first Australian poet to attain a wide readership. Following in his footsteps, Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson captured the experience of the bush using a distinctive Australian vocabulary. Their works are still popular; Paterson's bush poem "Waltzing Matilda" (1895) is regarded as Australia's unofficial national anthem. Miles Franklin is the namesake of Australia's most prestigious literary prize, awarded annually to the best novel about Australian life. Its first recipient, Patrick White, went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1973. Australian Booker Prize winners include Peter Carey, Thomas Keneally and Richard Flanagan. Authors David Malouf, Germaine Greer, Helen Garner, playwright David Williamson and poet Les Murray are also renowned.Many of Australia's performing arts companies receive funding through the federal government's Australia Council. There is a symphony orchestra in each state, and a national opera company, Opera Australia, well known for its famous soprano Joan Sutherland. At the beginning of the 20th century, Nellie Melba was one of the world's leading opera singers. Ballet and dance are represented by The Australian Ballet and various state companies. Each state has a publicly funded theatre company."The Story of the Kelly Gang" (1906), the world's first feature-length narrative film, spurred a boom in Australian cinema during the silent film era. After World War I, Hollywood monopolised the industry, and by the 1960s Australian film production had effectively ceased. With the benefit of government support, the Australian New Wave of the 1970s brought provocative and successful films, many exploring themes of national identity, such as "Wake in Fright" and "Gallipoli", while "Crocodile Dundee" and the Ozploitation movement's "Mad Max" series became international blockbusters. In a film market flooded with foreign content, Australian films delivered a 7.7% share of the local box office in 2015. The AACTAs are Australia's premier film and television awards, and notable Academy Award winners from Australia include Geoffrey Rush, Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett and Heath Ledger.Australia has two public broadcasters (the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the multicultural Special Broadcasting Service), three commercial television networks, several pay-TV services, and numerous public, non-profit television and radio stations. Each major city has at least one daily newspaper, and there are two national daily newspapers, "The Australian" and "The Australian Financial Review". In 2010, Reporters Without Borders placed Australia 18th on a list of 178 countries ranked by press freedom, behind New Zealand (8th) but ahead of the United Kingdom (19th) and United States (20th). This relatively low ranking is primarily because of the limited diversity of commercial media ownership in Australia; most print media are under the control of News Corporation and, after Fairfax Media was merged with Nine, Nine Entertainment Co.Most Indigenous Australian groups subsisted on a simple hunter-gatherer diet of native fauna and flora, otherwise called bush tucker. The first settlers introduced British food to the continent, much of which is now considered typical Australian food, such as the Sunday roast. Multicultural immigration transformed Australian cuisine; post-World War II European migrants, particularly from the Mediterranean, helped to build a thriving Australian coffee culture, and the influence of Asian cultures has led to Australian variants of their staple foods, such as the Chinese-inspired dim sim and Chiko Roll. Vegemite, pavlova, lamingtons and meat pies are regarded as iconic Australian foods.Australian wine is produced mainly in the southern, cooler parts of the country. Australia is also known for its cafe and coffee culture in urban centres, which has influenced coffee culture abroad, including New York City. Australia was responsible for the flat white coffee–purported to have originated in a Sydney cafe in the mid-1980s.Cricket and football are the predominate sports in Australia during the summer and winter months, respectively. Australia is unique in that it has professional leagues for four football codes. Originating in Melbourne in the 1850s, Australian rules football is the most popular code in all states except New South Wales and Queensland, where rugby league holds sway, followed by rugby union; the imaginary border separating areas where Australian rules football dominates from those were the two rugby codes prevail is known as the Barassi Line. Soccer, while ranked fourth in popularity and resources, has the highest overall participation rates. Cricket is popular across all borders and has been regarded by many Australians as the national sport. The Australian national cricket team competed against England in the first Test match (1877) and the first One Day International (1971), and against New Zealand in the first Twenty20 International (2004), winning all three games. It has also participated in every edition of the Cricket World Cup, winning the tournament a record five times.Australia is also notable for water-based sports, such as swimming and surfing. The surf lifesaving movement originated in Australia, and the volunteer lifesaver is one of the country's icons. Nationally, other popular sports include horse racing, basketball, and motor racing. The annual Melbourne Cup horse race and the Sydney to Hobart yacht race attract intense interest. In 2016, the Australian Sports Commission revealed that swimming, cycling and soccer are the three most popular participation sports.Australia is one of five nations to have participated in every Summer Olympics of the modern era, and has hosted the Games twice: 1956 in Melbourne and 2000 in Sydney. Australia has also participated in every Commonwealth Games, hosting the event in 1938, 1962, 1982, 2006 and 2018. Australia made its inaugural appearance at the Pacific Games in 2015. As well as being a regular FIFA World Cup participant, Australia has won the OFC Nations Cup four times and the AFC Asian Cup once—the only country to have won championships in two different FIFA confederations. In June 2020, Australia won its bid to co-host the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup with New Zealand. The country regularly competes among the world elite basketball teams as it is among the global top three teams in terms of qualifications to the Basketball Tournament at the Summer Olympics. Other major international events held in Australia include the Australian Open tennis grand slam tournament, international cricket matches, and the Australian Formula One Grand Prix. The highest-rating television programs include sports telecasts such as the Summer Olympics, FIFA World Cup, The Ashes, Rugby League State of Origin, and the grand finals of the National Rugby League and Australian Football League. Skiing in Australia began in the 1860s and snow sports take place in the Australian Alps and parts of Tasmania.
|
[
"Billy Hughes",
"Gough Whitlam",
"Malcolm Fraser",
"Joseph Cook",
"George Reid",
"John McEwen",
"Scott Morrison",
"Arthur Fadden",
"Malcolm Turnbull",
"Robert Menzies",
"Andrew Fisher",
"Harold Holt",
"Earle Page",
"John Howard",
"Edmund Barton",
"Frank Forde",
"Kevin Rudd",
"Tony Abbott",
"Ben Chifley",
"William McMahon",
"Paul Keating",
"Julia Gillard",
"Chris Watson",
"Anthony Albanese",
"Stanley Bruce",
"John Gorton",
"James Scullin",
"Bob Hawke",
"Alfred Deakin",
"John Curtin"
] |
|
Who was the head of Australia in Nov 05, 1937?
|
November 05, 1937
|
{
"text": [
"Joseph Lyons"
]
}
|
L2_Q408_P6_9
|
Arthur Fadden is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1941 to Oct, 1941.
James Scullin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1929 to Jan, 1932.
Edmund Barton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1901 to Sep, 1903.
Tony Abbott is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2013 to Sep, 2015.
Joseph Lyons is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1932 to Apr, 1939.
John McEwen is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1967 to Jan, 1968.
Alfred Deakin is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1905 to Nov, 1908.
Julia Gillard is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 2010 to Jun, 2013.
Chris Watson is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1904 to Aug, 1904.
Andrew Fisher is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1908 to Jun, 1909.
Scott Morrison is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 2018 to May, 2022.
John Gorton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1968 to Mar, 1971.
Robert Menzies is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1949 to Jan, 1966.
Frank Forde is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Jul, 1945.
Ben Chifley is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Dec, 1949.
Malcolm Turnbull is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2015 to Aug, 2018.
Bob Hawke is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1983 to Dec, 1991.
Billy Hughes is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1915 to Feb, 1923.
Joseph Cook is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 1913 to Sep, 1914.
John Howard is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1996 to Mar, 2007.
John Curtin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1941 to Jul, 1945.
Harold Holt is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1966 to Dec, 1967.
Malcolm Fraser is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1975 to Mar, 1983.
Anthony Albanese is the head of the government of Australia from May, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
Kevin Rudd is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 2007 to Jun, 2010.
George Reid is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1904 to Jul, 1905.
Stanley Bruce is the head of the government of Australia from Feb, 1923 to Oct, 1929.
Paul Keating is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1991 to Mar, 1996.
Gough Whitlam is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1972 to Nov, 1975.
William McMahon is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1971 to Dec, 1972.
Earle Page is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1939 to Apr, 1939.
|
AustraliaAustralia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia's population of nearly / 1000000 round 0 million, in an area of , is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Canberra is the nation's capital, while the largest city is Sydney, and other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide.Indigenous Australians inhabited the continent for about 65,000 years, prior to the first arrival of Dutch explorers in the early 17th century, who named it New Holland. In 1770, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain and initially settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788, a date which became Australia's national day. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the time of an 1850s gold rush, most of the continent had been explored by European settlers and an additional five self-governing crown colonies established. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy, comprising six states and ten territories.Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, and mountain ranges in the south-east. Australia generates its income from various sources, including mining-related exports, telecommunications, banking, manufacturing, and international education.Australia is a highly developed country, with the world's twelfth-largest economy. It has a high-income economy, with the world's tenth-highest per capita income. Australia is a regional power, and has the world's thirteenth-highest military expenditure. Immigrants account for 30% of the country's population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. Having the eight-highest Human Development Index, and the ninth-highest ranked democracy globally as of 2020, Australia ranks highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom, civil liberties, and political rights, with all its major cities faring exceptionally in global comparative livability surveys. It is a member of the United Nations, the G20, the Commonwealth of Nations, the ANZUS, the OECD, the WTO, the APEC, the Pacific Islands Forum, the Pacific Community and the ASEAN + 6 mechanism.The name "Australia" (pronounced in Australian English) is derived from the Latin "Terra Australis" ("southern land"), a name used for a hypothetical continent in the Southern Hemisphere since ancient times. When Europeans first began visiting and mapping Australia in the 17th century, the name "Terra Australis" was naturally applied to the new territories.Until the early 19th century, Australia was best known as "New Holland", a name first applied by the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in 1644 (as "Nieuw-Holland") and subsequently anglicised. "Terra Australis" still saw occasional usage, such as in scientific texts. The name "Australia" was popularised by the explorer Matthew Flinders, who said it was "more agreeable to the ear, and an assimilation to the names of the other great portions of the Earth". Several famous early cartographers also made use of the word Australia on maps. Gerardus Mercator used the phrase "climata " on his double cordiform map of the world of 1538, as did Gemma Frisius, who was Mercator's teacher and collaborator, on his own cordiform wall map in 1540. Australia appears in a book on astronomy by Cyriaco Jacob zum Barth published in Frankfurt am Main in 1545.The first time that "Australia" appears to have been officially used was in April 1817, when Governor Lachlan Macquarie acknowledged the receipt of Flinders' charts of Australia from Lord Bathurst. In December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted. In 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially by that name. The first official published use of the new name came with the publication in 1830 of "The Australia Directory" by the Hydrographic Office.Colloquial names for Australia include "Oz" and "the Land Down Under" (usually shortened to just "Down Under"). Other epithets include "the Great Southern Land", "the Lucky Country", "the Sunburnt Country", and "the Wide Brown Land". The latter two both derive from Dorothea Mackellar's 1908 poem "My Country".Human habitation of the Australian continent is known to have begun at least 65,000 years ago, with the migration of people by land bridges and short sea-crossings from what is now Southeast Asia. The Madjedbebe rock shelter in Arnhem Land is recognised as the oldest site showing the presence of humans in Australia. The oldest human remains found are the Lake Mungo remains, which have been dated to around 41,000 years ago. These people were the ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. Aboriginal Australian culture is one of the oldest continual cultures on Earth.At the time of first European contact, most Indigenous Australians were hunter-gatherers with complex economies and societies. Recent archaeological finds suggest that a population of 750,000 could have been sustained. Indigenous Australians have an oral culture with spiritual values based on reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, obtained their livelihood from seasonal horticulture and the resources of their reefs and seas. The northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by Makassan fishermen from what is now Indonesia.The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the "Duyfken" captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, and made landfall on 26 February 1606 at the Pennefather River near the modern town of Weipa on Cape York. Later that year, Spanish explorer Luís Vaz de Torres sailed through, and navigated, Torres Strait islands. The Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent "New Holland" during the 17th century, and although no attempt at settlement was made, a number of shipwrecks left men either stranded or, as in the case of the "Batavia" in 1629, marooned for mutiny and murder, thus becoming the first Europeans to permanently inhabit the continent. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688 (while serving as a crewman under pirate Captain John Read) and again in 1699 on a return trip. In 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain.With the loss of its American colonies in 1783, the British Government sent a fleet of ships, the "First Fleet", under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip, to establish a new penal colony in New South Wales. A camp was set up and the Union flag raised at Sydney Cove, Port Jackson, on 26 January 1788, a date which later became Australia's national day, Australia Day. Most early convicts were transported for petty crimes and assigned as labourers or servants upon arrival. While the majority settled into colonial society once emancipated, convict rebellions and uprisings were also staged, but invariably suppressed under martial law. The 1808 Rum Rebellion, the only successful armed takeover of government in Australia, instigated a two-year period of military rule.The indigenous population declined for 150 years following settlement, mainly due to infectious disease. Thousands more died as a result of frontier conflict with settlers. A government policy of "assimilation" beginning with the "Aboriginal Protection Act 1869" resulted in the removal of many Aboriginal children from their families and communities—referred to as the Stolen Generations — a practice which also contributed to the decline in the indigenous population. As a result of the 1967 referendum, the Federal government's power to enact special laws with respect to a particular race was extended to enable the making of laws with respect to Aboriginals. Traditional ownership of land ("native title") was not recognised in law until 1992, when the High Court of Australia held in "Mabo v Queensland (No 2)" that the legal doctrine that Australia had been "terra nullius" ("land belonging to no one") did not apply to Australia at the time of British settlement.The expansion of British control over other areas of the continent began in the early 19th century, initially confined to coastal regions. A settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land (present-day Tasmania) in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. In 1813, Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Wentworth crossed the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, opening the interior to European settlement. The British claim was extended to the whole Australian continent in 1827 when Major Edmund Lockyer established a settlement on King George Sound (modern-day Albany). The Swan River Colony (present-day Perth) was established in 1829, evolving into the largest Australian colony by area, Western Australia. In accordance with population growth, separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales: South Australia in 1836, New Zealand in 1841, Victoria in 1851, and Queensland in 1859. The Northern Territory was excised from South Australia in 1911. South Australia was founded as a "free province" — it was never a penal colony. Western Australia was also founded "free" but later accepted transported convicts, the last of which arrived in 1868, decades after transportation had ceased to the other colonies. In the mid-19th century, explorers such as Burke and Wills went further inland to determine its agricultural potential and answer scientific questions.A series of gold rushes beginning in the early 1850s led to an influx of new migrants from China, North America and continental Europe, and also spurred outbreaks of bushranging and civil unrest; the latter peaked in 1854 when Ballarat miners launched the Eureka Rebellion against gold license fees. Between 1855 and 1890, the six colonies individually gained responsible government, managing most of their own affairs while remaining part of the British Empire. The Colonial Office in London retained control of some matters, notably foreign affairs and defence.On 1 January 1901, federation of the colonies was achieved after a decade of planning, consultation and voting. After the 1907 Imperial Conference, Australia and the other self-governing British colonies were given the status of "dominion" within the British Empire. The Federal Capital Territory (later renamed the Australian Capital Territory) was formed in 1911 as the location for the future federal capital of Canberra. Melbourne was the temporary seat of government from 1901 to 1927 while Canberra was being constructed. The Northern Territory was transferred from the control of the South Australian government to the federal parliament in 1911. Australia became the colonial ruler of the Territory of Papua (which had initially been annexed by Queensland in 1883) in 1902 and of the Territory of New Guinea (formerly German New Guinea) in 1920. The two were unified as the Territory of Papua and New Guinea in 1949 and gained independence from Australia in 1975.In 1914, Australia joined Britain in fighting World War I, with support from both the outgoing Commonwealth Liberal Party and the incoming Australian Labor Party. Australians took part in many of the major battles fought on the Western Front. Of about 416,000 who served, about 60,000 were killed and another 152,000 were wounded. Many Australians regard the defeat of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs) at Gallipoli as the birth of the nation — its first major military action. The Kokoda Track campaign is regarded by many as an analogous nation-defining event during World War II.Britain's Statute of Westminster 1931 formally ended most of the constitutional links between Australia and the United Kingdom. Australia adopted it in 1942, but it was backdated to 1939 to confirm the validity of legislation passed by the Australian Parliament during World War II. The shock of Britain's defeat in Asia in 1942, followed soon after by the bombing of Darwin and other Japanese attacks, led to a widespread belief in Australia that an invasion was imminent, and a shift towards the United States as a new ally and protector. Since 1951, Australia has been a formal military ally of the United States, under the ANZUS treaty.After World War II, Australia encouraged immigration from mainland Europe. Since the 1970s and following the abolition of the White Australia policy, immigration from Asia and elsewhere was also promoted. As a result, Australia's demography, culture, and self-image were transformed. The "Australia Act 1986" severed the remaining constitutional ties between Australia and the United Kingdom. In a 1999 referendum, 55% of voters and a majority in every state rejected a proposal to become a republic with a president appointed by a two-thirds vote in both Houses of the Australian Parliament. There has been an increasing focus in foreign policy on ties with other Pacific Rim nations while maintaining close ties with Australia's traditional allies and trading partners.Surrounded by the Indian and Pacific oceans, Australia is separated from Asia by the Arafura and Timor seas, with the Coral Sea lying off the Queensland coast, and the Tasman Sea lying between Australia and New Zealand. The world's smallest continent and sixth largest country by total area, Australia—owing to its size and isolation—is often dubbed the "island continent" and is sometimes considered the world's largest island. Australia has of coastline (excluding all offshore islands), and claims an extensive Exclusive Economic Zone of . This exclusive economic zone does not include the Australian Antarctic Territory.Mainland Australia lies between latitudes 9° and 44° South, and longitudes 112° and 154° East. Australia's size gives it a wide variety of landscapes, with tropical rainforests in the north-east, mountain ranges in the south-east, south-west and east, and desert in the centre. The desert or semi-arid land commonly known as the outback makes up by far the largest portion of land. Australia is the driest inhabited continent; its annual rainfall averaged over continental area is less than 500 mm. The population density is 3.2 inhabitants per square kilometre, although a large proportion of the population lives along the temperate south-eastern coastline.The Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest coral reef, lies a short distance off the north-east coast and extends for over . Mount Augustus, claimed to be the world's largest monolith, is located in Western Australia. At , Mount Kosciuszko is the highest mountain on the Australian mainland. Even taller are Mawson Peak (at ), on the remote Australian external territory of Heard Island, and, in the Australian Antarctic Territory, Mount McClintock and Mount Menzies, at and respectively.Eastern Australia is marked by the Great Dividing Range, which runs parallel to the coast of Queensland, New South Wales and much of Victoria. The name is not strictly accurate, because parts of the range consist of low hills, and the highlands are typically no more than in height. The coastal uplands and a belt of Brigalow grasslands lie between the coast and the mountains, while inland of the dividing range are large areas of grassland and shrubland. These include the western plains of New South Wales, and the Mitchell Grass Downs and Mulga Lands of inland Queensland. The northernmost point of the mainland is the tropical Cape York Peninsula.The landscapes of the Top End and the Gulf Country—with their tropical climate—include forest, woodland, wetland, grassland, rainforest and desert. At the north-west corner of the continent are the sandstone cliffs and gorges of The Kimberley, and below that the Pilbara. The Victoria Plains tropical savanna lies south of the Kimberly and Arnhem Land savannas, forming a transition between the coastal savannas and the interior deserts. At the heart of the country are the uplands of central Australia. Prominent features of the centre and south include Uluru (also known as Ayers Rock), the famous sandstone monolith, and the inland Simpson, Tirari and Sturt Stony, Gibson, Great Sandy, Tanami, and Great Victoria deserts, with the famous Nullarbor Plain on the southern coast. The Western Australian mulga shrublands lie between the interior deserts and Mediterranean-climate Southwest Australia.Lying on the Indo-Australian Plate, the mainland of Australia is the lowest and most primordial landmass on Earth with a relatively stable geological history. The landmass includes virtually all known rock types and from all geological time periods spanning over 3.8 billion years of the Earth's history. The Pilbara Craton is one of only two pristine Archaean 3.6–2.7 Ga (billion years ago) crusts identified on the Earth.Having been part of all major supercontinents, the Australian continent began to form after the breakup of Gondwana in the Permian, with the separation of the continental landmass from the African continent and Indian subcontinent. It separated from Antarctica over a prolonged period beginning in the Permian and continuing through to the Cretaceous. When the last glacial period ended in about 10,000 BC, rising sea levels formed Bass Strait, separating Tasmania from the mainland. Then between about 8,000 and 6,500 BC, the lowlands in the north were flooded by the sea, separating New Guinea, the Aru Islands, and the mainland of Australia. The Australian continent is moving toward Eurasia at the rate of 6 to 7 centimetres a year.The Australian mainland's continental crust, excluding the thinned margins, has an average thickness of 38km, with a range in thickness from 24 km to 59 km. Australia's geology can be divided into several main sections, showcasing that the continent grew from west to east: the Archaean cratonic shields found mostly in the west, Proterozoic fold belts in the centre and Phanerozoic sedimentary basins, metamorphic and igneous rocks in the east.The Australian mainland and Tasmania are situated in the middle of the tectonic plate and have no active volcanoes, but due to passing over the East Australia hotspot, recent volcanism has occurred during the Holocene, in the Newer Volcanics Province of western Victoria and southeastern South Australia. Volcanism also occurs in the island of New Guinea (considered geologically as part of the Australian continent), and in the Australian external territory of Heard Island and McDonald Islands. Seismic activity in the Australian mainland and Tasmania is also low, with the greatest number of fatalities having occurred in the 1989 Newcastle earthquake.The climate of Australia is significantly influenced by ocean currents, including the Indian Ocean Dipole and the El Niño–Southern Oscillation, which is correlated with periodic drought, and the seasonal tropical low-pressure system that produces cyclones in northern Australia. These factors cause rainfall to vary markedly from year to year. Much of the northern part of the country has a tropical, predominantly summer-rainfall (monsoon). The south-west corner of the country has a Mediterranean climate. The south-east ranges from oceanic (Tasmania and coastal Victoria) to humid subtropical (upper half of New South Wales), with the highlands featuring alpine and subpolar oceanic climates. The interior is arid to semi-arid.Driven by climate change, average temperatures have risen more than 1°C since 1960. Associated changes in rainfall patterns and climate extremes exacerbate existing issues such as drought and bushfires. 2019 was Australia's warmest recorded year, and the 2019–2020 bushfire season was the country's worst on record. Australia's greenhouse gas emissions per capita are among the highest in the world.Water restrictions are frequently in place in many regions and cities of Australia in response to chronic shortages due to urban population increases and localised drought. Throughout much of the continent, major flooding regularly follows extended periods of drought, flushing out inland river systems, overflowing dams and inundating large inland flood plains, as occurred throughout Eastern Australia in the early 2010s after the 2000s Australian drought.Although most of Australia is semi-arid or desert, the continent includes a diverse range of habitats from alpine heaths to tropical rainforests. Fungi typify that diversity—an estimated 250,000 species—of which only 5% have been described—occur in Australia. Because of the continent's great age, extremely variable weather patterns, and long-term geographic isolation, much of Australia's biota is unique. About 85% of flowering plants, 84% of mammals, more than 45% of birds, and 89% of in-shore, temperate-zone fish are endemic. Australia has at least 755 species of reptile, more than any other country in the world. Besides Antarctica, Australia is the only continent that developed without feline species. Feral cats may have been introduced in the 17th century by Dutch shipwrecks, and later in the 18th century by European settlers. They are now considered a major factor in the decline and extinction of many vulnerable and endangered native species. Australia is also one of 17 megadiverse countries.Australian forests are mostly made up of evergreen species, particularly eucalyptus trees in the less arid regions; wattles replace them as the dominant species in drier regions and deserts. Among well-known Australian animals are the monotremes (the platypus and echidna); a host of marsupials, including the kangaroo, koala, and wombat, and birds such as the emu and the kookaburra. Australia is home to many dangerous animals including some of the most venomous snakes in the world. The dingo was introduced by Austronesian people who traded with Indigenous Australians around 3000 BCE. Many animal and plant species became extinct soon after first human settlement, including the Australian megafauna; others have disappeared since European settlement, among them the thylacine.Many of Australia's ecoregions, and the species within those regions, are threatened by human activities and introduced animal, chromistan, fungal and plant species. All these factors have led to Australia's having the highest mammal extinction rate of any country in the world. The federal "Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999" is the legal framework for the protection of threatened species. Numerous protected areas have been created under the National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia's Biological Diversity to protect and preserve unique ecosystems; 65 wetlands are listed under the Ramsar Convention, and 16 natural World Heritage Sites have been established. Australia was ranked 21st out of 178 countries in the world on the 2018 Environmental Performance Index. There are more than 1,800 animals and plants on Australia's threatened species list, including more than 500 animals.Australia is a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy. The country has maintained a stable liberal democratic political system under its constitution, which is one of the world's oldest, since Federation in 1901. It is also one of the world's oldest federations, in which power is divided between the federal and state and territorial governments. The Australian system of government combines elements derived from the political systems of the United Kingdom (a fused executive, constitutional monarchy and strong party discipline) and the United States (federalism, a written constitution and strong bicameralism with an elected upper house), along with distinctive indigenous features.The federal government is separated into three branches:Elizabeth II reigns as Queen of Australia and is represented in Australia by the governor-general at the federal level and by the governors at the state level, who by convention act on the advice of her ministers. Thus, in practice the governor-general acts as a legal figurehead for the actions of the prime minister and the Federal Executive Council. The governor-general does have extraordinary reserve powers which may be exercised outside the prime minister's request in rare and limited circumstances, the most notable exercise of which was the dismissal of the Whitlam Government in the constitutional crisis of 1975.In the Senate (the upper house), there are 76 senators: twelve each from the states and two each from the mainland territories (the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory). The House of Representatives (the lower house) has 151 members elected from single-member electoral divisions, commonly known as "electorates" or "seats", allocated to states on the basis of population, with each original state guaranteed a minimum of five seats. Elections for both chambers are normally held every three years simultaneously; senators have overlapping six-year terms except for those from the territories, whose terms are not fixed but are tied to the electoral cycle for the lower house; thus only 40 of the 76 places in the Senate are put to each election unless the cycle is interrupted by a double dissolution.Australia's electoral system uses preferential voting for all lower house elections with the exception of Tasmania and the ACT which, along with the Senate and most state upper houses, combine it with proportional representation in a system known as the single transferable vote. Voting is compulsory for all enrolled citizens 18 years and over in every jurisdiction, as is enrolment. The party with majority support in the House of Representatives forms the government and its leader becomes Prime Minister. In cases where no party has majority support, the Governor-General has the constitutional power to appoint the Prime Minister and, if necessary, dismiss one that has lost the confidence of Parliament. Due to the relatively unique position of Australia operating as a Westminster Parliamentary democracy with an elected upper house, the system has sometimes been referred to as having a "Washminster mutation", or as a Semi-parliamentary system. There are two major political groups that usually form government, federally and in the states: the Australian Labor Party and the Coalition which is a formal grouping of the Liberal Party and its minor partner, the National Party. Within Australian political culture, the Coalition is considered centre-right and the Labor Party is considered centre-left. Independent members and several minor parties have achieved representation in Australian parliaments, mostly in upper houses. The Australian Greens are often considered the "third force" in politics, being the third largest party by both vote and membership.The most recent federal election was held on 18 May 2019 and resulted in the Coalition, led by Prime Minister Scott Morrison, retaining government.Australia has six states — New South Wales (NSW), Queensland (QLD), South Australia (SA), Tasmania (TAS), Victoria (VIC) and Western Australia (WA) — and two major mainland territories—the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and the Northern Territory (NT). In most respects, these two territories function as states, except that the Commonwealth Parliament has the power to modify or repeal any legislation passed by the territory parliaments.Under the constitution, the states essentially have plenary legislative power to legislate on any subject, whereas the Commonwealth (federal) Parliament may legislate only within the subject areas enumerated under section 51. For example, state parliaments have the power to legislate with respect to education, criminal law and state police, health, transport, and local government, but the Commonwealth Parliament does not have any specific power to legislate in these areas. However, Commonwealth laws prevail over state laws to the extent of the inconsistency.Each state and major mainland territory has its own parliament — unicameral in the Northern Territory, the ACT and Queensland, and bicameral in the other states. The states are sovereign entities, although subject to certain powers of the Commonwealth as defined by the Constitution. The lower houses are known as the Legislative Assembly (the House of Assembly in South Australia and Tasmania); the upper houses are known as the Legislative Council. The head of the government in each state is the Premier and in each territory the Chief Minister. The Queen is represented in each state by a governor; and in the Northern Territory, the administrator. In the Commonwealth, the Queen's representative is the governor-general.The Commonwealth Parliament also directly administers the external territories of Ashmore and Cartier Islands, Christmas Island, the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, the Coral Sea Islands, Heard Island and McDonald Islands, and the claimed region of Australian Antarctic Territory, as well as the internal Jervis Bay Territory, a naval base and sea port for the national capital in land that was formerly part of New South Wales. The external territory of Norfolk Island previously exercised considerable autonomy under the "Norfolk Island Act 1979" through its own legislative assembly and an Administrator to represent the Queen. In 2015, the Commonwealth Parliament abolished self-government, integrating Norfolk Island into the Australian tax and welfare systems and replacing its legislative assembly with a council. Macquarie Island is part of Tasmania, and Lord Howe Island of New South Wales.Over recent decades, Australia's foreign relations have been driven by a close association with the United States through the ANZUS pact, and by a desire to develop relationships with Asia and the Pacific, particularly through Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Pacific Islands Forum and the Pacific Community, of which Australia is a founding member. In 2005, Australia secured an inaugural seat at the East Asia Summit following its accession to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, and in 2011 attended the Sixth East Asia Summit in Indonesia. Australia is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, in which the Commonwealth Heads of Government meetings provide the main forum for co-operation. Australia has pursued the cause of international trade liberalisation. It led the formation of the Cairns Group and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.Australia is a member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), and has pursued several major bilateral free trade agreements, most recently the Australia–United States Free Trade Agreement and Closer Economic Relations with New Zealand, with another free trade agreement being negotiated with China — the Australia–China Free Trade Agreement — and Japan, South Korea in 2011, Australia–Chile Free Trade Agreement, and has put the Trans-Pacific Partnership before parliament for ratification.Australia maintains a deeply integrated relationship with neighbouring New Zealand, with free mobility of citizens between the two countries under the Trans-Tasman Travel Arrangement and free trade under the Australia–New Zealand Closer Economic Relations Trade Agreement. New Zealand, Canada and the United Kingdom are the most favourably viewed countries in the world by Australian people.Along with New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Malaysia and Singapore, Australia is party to the Five Power Defence Arrangements, a regional defence agreement. A founding member country of the United Nations, Australia is strongly committed to multilateralism and maintains an international aid program under which some 60 countries receive assistance. The 2005–2006 budget provides AU$2.5 billion for development assistance. Australia ranks fifteenth overall in the Center for Global Development's 2012 Commitment to Development Index.Australia's armed forces—the Australian Defence Force (ADF) — comprise the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), the Australian Army and the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), in total numbering 81,214 personnel (including 57,982 regulars and 23,232 reservists) . The titular role of Commander-in-Chief is vested in the Governor-General, who appoints a Chief of the Defence Force from one of the armed services on the advice of the government. In a diarchy, the CDF serves as co-chairman of the Defence Committee, conjointly with the Secretary of Defence, in the command and control of the Australian Defence Organisation.In the 2016–2017 budget, defence spending comprised 2% of GDP, representing the world's 12th largest defence budget. Australia has been involved in United Nations and regional peacekeeping, disaster relief and armed conflict, including the 2003 invasion of Iraq; Australia currently has deployed about 2,241 personnel in varying capacities to 12 international operations in areas including Iraq and Afghanistan.A wealthy country, Australia has a market economy, a high GDP per capita, and a relatively low rate of poverty. In terms of average wealth, Australia ranked second in the world after Switzerland from 2013 until 2018. In 2018, Australia overtook Switzerland and became the country with the highest average wealth. Australia's relative poverty rate is 13.6%. It was identified by the Credit Suisse Research Institute as the nation with the highest median wealth in the world and the second-highest average wealth per adult in 2013.The Australian dollar is the currency for the nation, including Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and Norfolk Island, as well as the independent Pacific Island states of Kiribati, Nauru, and Tuvalu. With the 2006 merger of the Australian Stock Exchange and the Sydney Futures Exchange, the Australian Securities Exchange became the ninth largest in the world.Ranked fifth in the Index of Economic Freedom (2017), Australia is the world's 13th largest economy and has the tenth highest per capita GDP (nominal) at US$55,692. The country was ranked third in the United Nations 2017 Human Development Index. Melbourne reached top spot for the fourth year in a row on "The Economist"s 2014 list of the world's most liveable cities, followed by Adelaide, Sydney, and Perth in the fifth, seventh, and ninth places respectively. Total government debt in Australia is about A$190 billion—20% of GDP in 2010. Australia has among the highest house prices and some of the highest household debt levels in the world.An emphasis on exporting commodities rather than manufactured goods has underpinned a significant increase in Australia's terms of trade since the start of the 21st century, due to rising commodity prices. Australia has a balance of payments that is more than 7% of GDP negative, and has had persistently large current account deficits for more than 50 years. Australia has grown at an average annual rate of 3.6% for over 15 years, in comparison to the OECD annual average of 2.5%.Australia was the only advanced economy not to experience a recession due to the global financial downturn in 2008–2009. However, the economies of six of Australia's major trading partners were in recession, which in turn affected Australia, significantly hampering its economic growth. From 2012 to early 2013, Australia's national economy grew, but some non-mining states and Australia's non-mining economy experienced a recession.The Hawke Government floated the Australian dollar in 1983 and partially deregulated the financial system. The Howard Government followed with a partial deregulation of the labour market and the further privatisation of state-owned businesses, most notably in the telecommunications industry. The indirect tax system was substantially changed in July 2000 with the introduction of a 10% Goods and Services Tax (GST). In Australia's tax system, personal and company income tax are the main sources of government revenue., there were 12,640,800 people employed (either full- or part-time), with an unemployment rate of 5.2%. Data released in mid-November 2013 showed that the number of welfare recipients had grown by 55%. In 2007 228,621 Newstart unemployment allowance recipients were registered, a total that increased to 646,414 in March 2013. According to the Graduate Careers Survey, full-time employment for newly qualified professionals from various occupations has declined since 2011 but it increases for graduates three years after graduation.Access to biocapacity in Australia is much higher than world average. In 2016, Australia had 12.3 global hectares of biocapacity per person within its territory, much more than the world average of 1.6 global hectares per person. In 2016 Australia used 6.6 global hectares of biocapacity per person – their ecological footprint of consumption. This means they use half as much biocapacity as Australia contains. As a result, Australia is running a biocapacity reserve.In 2020 the Australian Council of Social Service released a report stating that relative poverty was growing in Australia, with an estimated 3.2 million people, or 13.6% of the population, living below an internationally accepted relative poverty threshold of 50% of a country's median income. It also estimated that there were 774,000 (17.7%) children under the age of 15 in relative poverty.Australia has an average population density of / 7682300 round 1 persons per square kilometre of total land area, which makes it one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world. The population is heavily concentrated on the east coast, and in particular in the south-eastern region between South East Queensland to the north-east and Adelaide to the south-west.Australia is highly urbanised, with 67% of the population living in the Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (metropolitan areas of the state and mainland territorial capital cities) in 2018. Metropolitan areas with more than one million inhabitants are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.In common with many other developed countries, Australia is experiencing a demographic shift towards an older population, with more retirees and fewer people of working age. In 2018 the average age of the Australian population was 38.8 years. In 2015, 2.15% of the Australian population lived overseas, one of the worldwide.Between 1788 and the Second World War, the vast majority of settlers and immigrants came from the British Isles (principally England, Ireland and Scotland), although there was significant immigration from China and Germany during the 19th century. In the decades immediately following the Second World War, Australia received a large wave of immigration from across Europe, with many more immigrants arriving from Southern and Eastern Europe than in previous decades. Since the end of the White Australia policy in 1973, Australia has pursued an official policy of multiculturalism, and there has been a large and continuing wave of immigration from across the world, with Asia being the largest source of immigrants in the 21st century.Today, Australia has the world's eighth-largest immigrant population, with immigrants accounting for 30% of the population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. 160,323 permanent immigrants were admitted to Australia in 2018–2019 (excluding refugees), whilst there was a net population gain of 239,600 people from all permanent and temporary immigration in that year. The majority of immigrants are skilled, but the immigration program includes categories for family members and refugees. In 2020, the largest foreign-born populations were those born in England (3.8%), India (2.8%), Mainland China (2.5%), New Zealand (2.2%), the Philippines (1.2%) and Vietnam (1.1%).In the 2016 Australian census, the most commonly nominated ancestries were: At the 2016 census, 649,171 people (2.8% of the total population) identified as being Indigenous — Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders. Indigenous Australians experience higher than average rates of imprisonment and unemployment, lower levels of education, and life expectancies for males and females that are, respectively, 11 and 17 years lower than those of non-indigenous Australians. Some remote Indigenous communities have been described as having "failed state"-like conditions.Although Australia has no official language, English is the "de facto" national language. Australian English is a major variety of the language with a distinctive accent and lexicon, and differs slightly from other varieties of English in grammar and spelling. General Australian serves as the standard dialect.According to the 2016 census, English is the only language spoken in the home for 72.7% of the population. The next most common languages spoken at home are Mandarin (2.5%), Arabic (1.4%), Cantonese (1.2%), Vietnamese (1.2%) and Italian (1.2%). Over 250 Indigenous Australian languages are thought to have existed at the time of first European contact, of which fewer than twenty are still in daily use by all age groups. About 110 others are spoken exclusively by older people. At the time of the 2006 census, 52,000 Indigenous Australians, representing 12% of the Indigenous population, reported that they spoke an Indigenous language at home. Australia has a sign language known as Auslan, which is the main language of about 10,112 deaf people who reported that they spoke Auslan language at home in the 2016 census.Australia has no state religion; Section 116 of the Australian Constitution prohibits the federal government from making any law to establish any religion, impose any religious observance, or prohibit the free exercise of any religion. In the 2016 census, 52.1% of Australians were counted as Christian, including 22.6% as Catholic and 13.3% as Anglican; 30.1% of the population reported having "no religion"; 8.2% identify with non-Christian religions, the largest of these being Islam (2.6%), followed by Buddhism (2.4%), Hinduism (1.9%), Sikhism (0.5%) and Judaism (0.4%). The remaining 9.7% of the population did not provide an adequate answer. Those who reported having no religion increased conspicuously from 19% in 2006 to 22% in 2011 to 30.1% in 2016.Before European settlement, the animist beliefs of Australia's indigenous people had been practised for many thousands of years. Mainland Aboriginal Australians' spirituality is known as the Dreaming and it places a heavy emphasis on belonging to the land. The collection of stories that it contains shaped Aboriginal law and customs. Aboriginal art, story and dance continue to draw on these spiritual traditions. The spirituality and customs of Torres Strait Islanders, who inhabit the islands between Australia and New Guinea, reflected their Melanesian origins and dependence on the sea. The 1996 Australian census counted more than 7000 respondents as followers of a traditional Aboriginal religion.Since the arrival of the First Fleet of British ships in 1788, Christianity has become the major religion practised in Australia. Christian churches have played an integral role in the development of education, health and welfare services in Australia. For much of Australian history, the Church of England (now known as the Anglican Church of Australia) was the largest religious denomination, with a large Roman Catholic minority. However, multicultural immigration has contributed to a steep decline in its relative position since the Second World War. Similarly, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism and Judaism have all grown in Australia over the past half-century.Australia has one of the lowest levels of religious adherence in the world. In 2018, 13% of women and 10% of men reported attending church at least weekly.Australia's life expectancy is the fourth highest in the world for males and the third highest for females. Life expectancy in Australia in 2014–2016 was 80.4 years for males and 84.6 years for females. Australia has the highest rates of skin cancer in the world, while cigarette smoking is the largest preventable cause of death and disease, responsible for 7.8% of the total mortality and disease. Ranked second in preventable causes is hypertension at 7.6%, with obesity third at 7.5%. Australia ranks 35th in the world and near the top of developed nations for its proportion of obese adults and nearly two thirds (63%) of its adult population is either overweight or obese.Total expenditure on health (including private sector spending) is around 9.8% of GDP. Australia introduced universal health care in 1975. Known as Medicare, it is now nominally funded by an income tax surcharge known as the Medicare levy, currently at 2%. The states manage hospitals and attached outpatient services, while the Commonwealth funds the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (subsidising the costs of medicines) and general practice.School attendance, or registration for home schooling, is compulsory throughout Australia. Education is the responsibility of the individual states and territories so the rules vary between states, but in general children are required to attend school from the age of about 5 until about 16. In some states (e.g., Western Australia, the Northern Territory and New South Wales), children aged 16–17 are required to either attend school or participate in vocational training, such as an apprenticeship.Australia has an adult literacy rate that was estimated to be 99% in 2003. However, a 2011–2012 report for the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that Tasmania has a literacy and numeracy rate of only 50%.Australia has 37 government-funded universities and three private universities, as well as a number of other specialist institutions that provide approved courses at the higher education level. The OECD places Australia among the most expensive nations to attend university. There is a state-based system of vocational training, known as TAFE, and many trades conduct apprenticeships for training new tradespeople. About 58% of Australians aged from 25 to 64 have vocational or tertiary qualifications, and the tertiary graduation rate of 49% is the highest among OECD countries. 30.9% of Australia's population has attained a higher education qualification, which is among the highest percentages in the world.Australia has the highest ratio of international students per head of population in the world by a large margin, with 812,000 international students enrolled in the nation's universities and vocational institutions in 2019. Accordingly, in 2019, international students represented on average 26.7% of the student bodies of Australian universities. International education therefore represents one of the country's largest exports and has a pronounced influence on the country's demographics, with a significant proportion of international students remaining in Australia after graduation on various skill and employment visas.In 2003, Australia's energy sources were coal (58.4%), hydropower (19.1%), natural gas (13.5%), liquid/gas fossil fuel-switching plants (5.4%), oil (2.9%), and other renewable resources like wind power, solar energy, and bioenergy (0.7%). During the 21st century, Australia has been trending to generate more energy using renewable resources and less energy using fossil fuels. In 2020, Australia used coal for 62% of all energy (3.6% increase compared to 2013), wind power for 9.9% (9.5% increase), natural gas for 9.9% (3.6% decrease), solar power for 9.9% (9.8% increase), hydropower for 6.4% (12.7% decrease), bioenergy for 1.4% (1.2% increase), and other sources like oil and waste coal mine gas for 0.5%.In August 2009, Australia's government set a goal to achieve 20% of all energy in the country from renewable sources by 2020. They achieved this goal, as renewable resources accounted for 27.7% of Australia's energy in 2020.Since 1788, the primary influence behind Australian culture has been Anglo-Celtic Western culture, with some Indigenous influences. The divergence and evolution that has occurred in the ensuing centuries has resulted in a distinctive Australian culture. The culture of the United States has served as a significant influence, particularly through television and cinema. Other cultural influences come from neighbouring Asian countries, and through large-scale immigration from non-English-speaking nations.Australia has over 100,000 Aboriginal rock art sites, and traditional designs, patterns and stories infuse contemporary Indigenous Australian art, "the last great art movement of the 20th century" according to critic Robert Hughes; its exponents include Emily Kame Kngwarreye. Early colonial artists showed a fascination with the unfamiliar land. The impressionistic works of Arthur Streeton, Tom Roberts and other members of the 19th-century Heidelberg School—the first "distinctively Australian" movement in Western art—gave expression to nationalist sentiments in the lead-up to Federation. While the school remained influential into the 1900s, modernists such as Margaret Preston, and, later, Sidney Nolan and Arthur Boyd, explored new artistic trends. The landscape remained a central subject matter for Fred Williams, Brett Whiteley and other post-war artists whose works, eclectic in style yet uniquely Australian, moved between the figurative and the abstract. The national and state galleries maintain collections of local and international art. Australia has one of the world's highest attendances of art galleries and museums per head of population.Australian literature grew slowly in the decades following European settlement though Indigenous oral traditions, many of which have since been recorded in writing, are much older. In the 1870s, Adam Lindsay Gordon posthumously became the first Australian poet to attain a wide readership. Following in his footsteps, Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson captured the experience of the bush using a distinctive Australian vocabulary. Their works are still popular; Paterson's bush poem "Waltzing Matilda" (1895) is regarded as Australia's unofficial national anthem. Miles Franklin is the namesake of Australia's most prestigious literary prize, awarded annually to the best novel about Australian life. Its first recipient, Patrick White, went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1973. Australian Booker Prize winners include Peter Carey, Thomas Keneally and Richard Flanagan. Authors David Malouf, Germaine Greer, Helen Garner, playwright David Williamson and poet Les Murray are also renowned.Many of Australia's performing arts companies receive funding through the federal government's Australia Council. There is a symphony orchestra in each state, and a national opera company, Opera Australia, well known for its famous soprano Joan Sutherland. At the beginning of the 20th century, Nellie Melba was one of the world's leading opera singers. Ballet and dance are represented by The Australian Ballet and various state companies. Each state has a publicly funded theatre company."The Story of the Kelly Gang" (1906), the world's first feature-length narrative film, spurred a boom in Australian cinema during the silent film era. After World War I, Hollywood monopolised the industry, and by the 1960s Australian film production had effectively ceased. With the benefit of government support, the Australian New Wave of the 1970s brought provocative and successful films, many exploring themes of national identity, such as "Wake in Fright" and "Gallipoli", while "Crocodile Dundee" and the Ozploitation movement's "Mad Max" series became international blockbusters. In a film market flooded with foreign content, Australian films delivered a 7.7% share of the local box office in 2015. The AACTAs are Australia's premier film and television awards, and notable Academy Award winners from Australia include Geoffrey Rush, Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett and Heath Ledger.Australia has two public broadcasters (the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the multicultural Special Broadcasting Service), three commercial television networks, several pay-TV services, and numerous public, non-profit television and radio stations. Each major city has at least one daily newspaper, and there are two national daily newspapers, "The Australian" and "The Australian Financial Review". In 2010, Reporters Without Borders placed Australia 18th on a list of 178 countries ranked by press freedom, behind New Zealand (8th) but ahead of the United Kingdom (19th) and United States (20th). This relatively low ranking is primarily because of the limited diversity of commercial media ownership in Australia; most print media are under the control of News Corporation and, after Fairfax Media was merged with Nine, Nine Entertainment Co.Most Indigenous Australian groups subsisted on a simple hunter-gatherer diet of native fauna and flora, otherwise called bush tucker. The first settlers introduced British food to the continent, much of which is now considered typical Australian food, such as the Sunday roast. Multicultural immigration transformed Australian cuisine; post-World War II European migrants, particularly from the Mediterranean, helped to build a thriving Australian coffee culture, and the influence of Asian cultures has led to Australian variants of their staple foods, such as the Chinese-inspired dim sim and Chiko Roll. Vegemite, pavlova, lamingtons and meat pies are regarded as iconic Australian foods.Australian wine is produced mainly in the southern, cooler parts of the country. Australia is also known for its cafe and coffee culture in urban centres, which has influenced coffee culture abroad, including New York City. Australia was responsible for the flat white coffee–purported to have originated in a Sydney cafe in the mid-1980s.Cricket and football are the predominate sports in Australia during the summer and winter months, respectively. Australia is unique in that it has professional leagues for four football codes. Originating in Melbourne in the 1850s, Australian rules football is the most popular code in all states except New South Wales and Queensland, where rugby league holds sway, followed by rugby union; the imaginary border separating areas where Australian rules football dominates from those were the two rugby codes prevail is known as the Barassi Line. Soccer, while ranked fourth in popularity and resources, has the highest overall participation rates. Cricket is popular across all borders and has been regarded by many Australians as the national sport. The Australian national cricket team competed against England in the first Test match (1877) and the first One Day International (1971), and against New Zealand in the first Twenty20 International (2004), winning all three games. It has also participated in every edition of the Cricket World Cup, winning the tournament a record five times.Australia is also notable for water-based sports, such as swimming and surfing. The surf lifesaving movement originated in Australia, and the volunteer lifesaver is one of the country's icons. Nationally, other popular sports include horse racing, basketball, and motor racing. The annual Melbourne Cup horse race and the Sydney to Hobart yacht race attract intense interest. In 2016, the Australian Sports Commission revealed that swimming, cycling and soccer are the three most popular participation sports.Australia is one of five nations to have participated in every Summer Olympics of the modern era, and has hosted the Games twice: 1956 in Melbourne and 2000 in Sydney. Australia has also participated in every Commonwealth Games, hosting the event in 1938, 1962, 1982, 2006 and 2018. Australia made its inaugural appearance at the Pacific Games in 2015. As well as being a regular FIFA World Cup participant, Australia has won the OFC Nations Cup four times and the AFC Asian Cup once—the only country to have won championships in two different FIFA confederations. In June 2020, Australia won its bid to co-host the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup with New Zealand. The country regularly competes among the world elite basketball teams as it is among the global top three teams in terms of qualifications to the Basketball Tournament at the Summer Olympics. Other major international events held in Australia include the Australian Open tennis grand slam tournament, international cricket matches, and the Australian Formula One Grand Prix. The highest-rating television programs include sports telecasts such as the Summer Olympics, FIFA World Cup, The Ashes, Rugby League State of Origin, and the grand finals of the National Rugby League and Australian Football League. Skiing in Australia began in the 1860s and snow sports take place in the Australian Alps and parts of Tasmania.
|
[
"Billy Hughes",
"Gough Whitlam",
"Malcolm Fraser",
"Joseph Cook",
"George Reid",
"John McEwen",
"Scott Morrison",
"Arthur Fadden",
"Malcolm Turnbull",
"Robert Menzies",
"Andrew Fisher",
"Harold Holt",
"Earle Page",
"John Howard",
"Edmund Barton",
"Frank Forde",
"Kevin Rudd",
"Tony Abbott",
"Ben Chifley",
"William McMahon",
"Paul Keating",
"Julia Gillard",
"Chris Watson",
"Anthony Albanese",
"Stanley Bruce",
"John Gorton",
"James Scullin",
"Bob Hawke",
"Alfred Deakin",
"John Curtin"
] |
|
Who was the head of Australia in 11/05/1937?
|
November 05, 1937
|
{
"text": [
"Joseph Lyons"
]
}
|
L2_Q408_P6_9
|
Arthur Fadden is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1941 to Oct, 1941.
James Scullin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1929 to Jan, 1932.
Edmund Barton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1901 to Sep, 1903.
Tony Abbott is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2013 to Sep, 2015.
Joseph Lyons is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1932 to Apr, 1939.
John McEwen is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1967 to Jan, 1968.
Alfred Deakin is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1905 to Nov, 1908.
Julia Gillard is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 2010 to Jun, 2013.
Chris Watson is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1904 to Aug, 1904.
Andrew Fisher is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1908 to Jun, 1909.
Scott Morrison is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 2018 to May, 2022.
John Gorton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1968 to Mar, 1971.
Robert Menzies is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1949 to Jan, 1966.
Frank Forde is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Jul, 1945.
Ben Chifley is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Dec, 1949.
Malcolm Turnbull is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2015 to Aug, 2018.
Bob Hawke is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1983 to Dec, 1991.
Billy Hughes is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1915 to Feb, 1923.
Joseph Cook is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 1913 to Sep, 1914.
John Howard is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1996 to Mar, 2007.
John Curtin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1941 to Jul, 1945.
Harold Holt is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1966 to Dec, 1967.
Malcolm Fraser is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1975 to Mar, 1983.
Anthony Albanese is the head of the government of Australia from May, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
Kevin Rudd is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 2007 to Jun, 2010.
George Reid is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1904 to Jul, 1905.
Stanley Bruce is the head of the government of Australia from Feb, 1923 to Oct, 1929.
Paul Keating is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1991 to Mar, 1996.
Gough Whitlam is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1972 to Nov, 1975.
William McMahon is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1971 to Dec, 1972.
Earle Page is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1939 to Apr, 1939.
|
AustraliaAustralia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia's population of nearly / 1000000 round 0 million, in an area of , is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Canberra is the nation's capital, while the largest city is Sydney, and other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide.Indigenous Australians inhabited the continent for about 65,000 years, prior to the first arrival of Dutch explorers in the early 17th century, who named it New Holland. In 1770, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain and initially settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788, a date which became Australia's national day. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the time of an 1850s gold rush, most of the continent had been explored by European settlers and an additional five self-governing crown colonies established. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy, comprising six states and ten territories.Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, and mountain ranges in the south-east. Australia generates its income from various sources, including mining-related exports, telecommunications, banking, manufacturing, and international education.Australia is a highly developed country, with the world's twelfth-largest economy. It has a high-income economy, with the world's tenth-highest per capita income. Australia is a regional power, and has the world's thirteenth-highest military expenditure. Immigrants account for 30% of the country's population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. Having the eight-highest Human Development Index, and the ninth-highest ranked democracy globally as of 2020, Australia ranks highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom, civil liberties, and political rights, with all its major cities faring exceptionally in global comparative livability surveys. It is a member of the United Nations, the G20, the Commonwealth of Nations, the ANZUS, the OECD, the WTO, the APEC, the Pacific Islands Forum, the Pacific Community and the ASEAN + 6 mechanism.The name "Australia" (pronounced in Australian English) is derived from the Latin "Terra Australis" ("southern land"), a name used for a hypothetical continent in the Southern Hemisphere since ancient times. When Europeans first began visiting and mapping Australia in the 17th century, the name "Terra Australis" was naturally applied to the new territories.Until the early 19th century, Australia was best known as "New Holland", a name first applied by the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in 1644 (as "Nieuw-Holland") and subsequently anglicised. "Terra Australis" still saw occasional usage, such as in scientific texts. The name "Australia" was popularised by the explorer Matthew Flinders, who said it was "more agreeable to the ear, and an assimilation to the names of the other great portions of the Earth". Several famous early cartographers also made use of the word Australia on maps. Gerardus Mercator used the phrase "climata " on his double cordiform map of the world of 1538, as did Gemma Frisius, who was Mercator's teacher and collaborator, on his own cordiform wall map in 1540. Australia appears in a book on astronomy by Cyriaco Jacob zum Barth published in Frankfurt am Main in 1545.The first time that "Australia" appears to have been officially used was in April 1817, when Governor Lachlan Macquarie acknowledged the receipt of Flinders' charts of Australia from Lord Bathurst. In December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted. In 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially by that name. The first official published use of the new name came with the publication in 1830 of "The Australia Directory" by the Hydrographic Office.Colloquial names for Australia include "Oz" and "the Land Down Under" (usually shortened to just "Down Under"). Other epithets include "the Great Southern Land", "the Lucky Country", "the Sunburnt Country", and "the Wide Brown Land". The latter two both derive from Dorothea Mackellar's 1908 poem "My Country".Human habitation of the Australian continent is known to have begun at least 65,000 years ago, with the migration of people by land bridges and short sea-crossings from what is now Southeast Asia. The Madjedbebe rock shelter in Arnhem Land is recognised as the oldest site showing the presence of humans in Australia. The oldest human remains found are the Lake Mungo remains, which have been dated to around 41,000 years ago. These people were the ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. Aboriginal Australian culture is one of the oldest continual cultures on Earth.At the time of first European contact, most Indigenous Australians were hunter-gatherers with complex economies and societies. Recent archaeological finds suggest that a population of 750,000 could have been sustained. Indigenous Australians have an oral culture with spiritual values based on reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, obtained their livelihood from seasonal horticulture and the resources of their reefs and seas. The northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by Makassan fishermen from what is now Indonesia.The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the "Duyfken" captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, and made landfall on 26 February 1606 at the Pennefather River near the modern town of Weipa on Cape York. Later that year, Spanish explorer Luís Vaz de Torres sailed through, and navigated, Torres Strait islands. The Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent "New Holland" during the 17th century, and although no attempt at settlement was made, a number of shipwrecks left men either stranded or, as in the case of the "Batavia" in 1629, marooned for mutiny and murder, thus becoming the first Europeans to permanently inhabit the continent. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688 (while serving as a crewman under pirate Captain John Read) and again in 1699 on a return trip. In 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain.With the loss of its American colonies in 1783, the British Government sent a fleet of ships, the "First Fleet", under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip, to establish a new penal colony in New South Wales. A camp was set up and the Union flag raised at Sydney Cove, Port Jackson, on 26 January 1788, a date which later became Australia's national day, Australia Day. Most early convicts were transported for petty crimes and assigned as labourers or servants upon arrival. While the majority settled into colonial society once emancipated, convict rebellions and uprisings were also staged, but invariably suppressed under martial law. The 1808 Rum Rebellion, the only successful armed takeover of government in Australia, instigated a two-year period of military rule.The indigenous population declined for 150 years following settlement, mainly due to infectious disease. Thousands more died as a result of frontier conflict with settlers. A government policy of "assimilation" beginning with the "Aboriginal Protection Act 1869" resulted in the removal of many Aboriginal children from their families and communities—referred to as the Stolen Generations — a practice which also contributed to the decline in the indigenous population. As a result of the 1967 referendum, the Federal government's power to enact special laws with respect to a particular race was extended to enable the making of laws with respect to Aboriginals. Traditional ownership of land ("native title") was not recognised in law until 1992, when the High Court of Australia held in "Mabo v Queensland (No 2)" that the legal doctrine that Australia had been "terra nullius" ("land belonging to no one") did not apply to Australia at the time of British settlement.The expansion of British control over other areas of the continent began in the early 19th century, initially confined to coastal regions. A settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land (present-day Tasmania) in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. In 1813, Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Wentworth crossed the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, opening the interior to European settlement. The British claim was extended to the whole Australian continent in 1827 when Major Edmund Lockyer established a settlement on King George Sound (modern-day Albany). The Swan River Colony (present-day Perth) was established in 1829, evolving into the largest Australian colony by area, Western Australia. In accordance with population growth, separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales: South Australia in 1836, New Zealand in 1841, Victoria in 1851, and Queensland in 1859. The Northern Territory was excised from South Australia in 1911. South Australia was founded as a "free province" — it was never a penal colony. Western Australia was also founded "free" but later accepted transported convicts, the last of which arrived in 1868, decades after transportation had ceased to the other colonies. In the mid-19th century, explorers such as Burke and Wills went further inland to determine its agricultural potential and answer scientific questions.A series of gold rushes beginning in the early 1850s led to an influx of new migrants from China, North America and continental Europe, and also spurred outbreaks of bushranging and civil unrest; the latter peaked in 1854 when Ballarat miners launched the Eureka Rebellion against gold license fees. Between 1855 and 1890, the six colonies individually gained responsible government, managing most of their own affairs while remaining part of the British Empire. The Colonial Office in London retained control of some matters, notably foreign affairs and defence.On 1 January 1901, federation of the colonies was achieved after a decade of planning, consultation and voting. After the 1907 Imperial Conference, Australia and the other self-governing British colonies were given the status of "dominion" within the British Empire. The Federal Capital Territory (later renamed the Australian Capital Territory) was formed in 1911 as the location for the future federal capital of Canberra. Melbourne was the temporary seat of government from 1901 to 1927 while Canberra was being constructed. The Northern Territory was transferred from the control of the South Australian government to the federal parliament in 1911. Australia became the colonial ruler of the Territory of Papua (which had initially been annexed by Queensland in 1883) in 1902 and of the Territory of New Guinea (formerly German New Guinea) in 1920. The two were unified as the Territory of Papua and New Guinea in 1949 and gained independence from Australia in 1975.In 1914, Australia joined Britain in fighting World War I, with support from both the outgoing Commonwealth Liberal Party and the incoming Australian Labor Party. Australians took part in many of the major battles fought on the Western Front. Of about 416,000 who served, about 60,000 were killed and another 152,000 were wounded. Many Australians regard the defeat of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs) at Gallipoli as the birth of the nation — its first major military action. The Kokoda Track campaign is regarded by many as an analogous nation-defining event during World War II.Britain's Statute of Westminster 1931 formally ended most of the constitutional links between Australia and the United Kingdom. Australia adopted it in 1942, but it was backdated to 1939 to confirm the validity of legislation passed by the Australian Parliament during World War II. The shock of Britain's defeat in Asia in 1942, followed soon after by the bombing of Darwin and other Japanese attacks, led to a widespread belief in Australia that an invasion was imminent, and a shift towards the United States as a new ally and protector. Since 1951, Australia has been a formal military ally of the United States, under the ANZUS treaty.After World War II, Australia encouraged immigration from mainland Europe. Since the 1970s and following the abolition of the White Australia policy, immigration from Asia and elsewhere was also promoted. As a result, Australia's demography, culture, and self-image were transformed. The "Australia Act 1986" severed the remaining constitutional ties between Australia and the United Kingdom. In a 1999 referendum, 55% of voters and a majority in every state rejected a proposal to become a republic with a president appointed by a two-thirds vote in both Houses of the Australian Parliament. There has been an increasing focus in foreign policy on ties with other Pacific Rim nations while maintaining close ties with Australia's traditional allies and trading partners.Surrounded by the Indian and Pacific oceans, Australia is separated from Asia by the Arafura and Timor seas, with the Coral Sea lying off the Queensland coast, and the Tasman Sea lying between Australia and New Zealand. The world's smallest continent and sixth largest country by total area, Australia—owing to its size and isolation—is often dubbed the "island continent" and is sometimes considered the world's largest island. Australia has of coastline (excluding all offshore islands), and claims an extensive Exclusive Economic Zone of . This exclusive economic zone does not include the Australian Antarctic Territory.Mainland Australia lies between latitudes 9° and 44° South, and longitudes 112° and 154° East. Australia's size gives it a wide variety of landscapes, with tropical rainforests in the north-east, mountain ranges in the south-east, south-west and east, and desert in the centre. The desert or semi-arid land commonly known as the outback makes up by far the largest portion of land. Australia is the driest inhabited continent; its annual rainfall averaged over continental area is less than 500 mm. The population density is 3.2 inhabitants per square kilometre, although a large proportion of the population lives along the temperate south-eastern coastline.The Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest coral reef, lies a short distance off the north-east coast and extends for over . Mount Augustus, claimed to be the world's largest monolith, is located in Western Australia. At , Mount Kosciuszko is the highest mountain on the Australian mainland. Even taller are Mawson Peak (at ), on the remote Australian external territory of Heard Island, and, in the Australian Antarctic Territory, Mount McClintock and Mount Menzies, at and respectively.Eastern Australia is marked by the Great Dividing Range, which runs parallel to the coast of Queensland, New South Wales and much of Victoria. The name is not strictly accurate, because parts of the range consist of low hills, and the highlands are typically no more than in height. The coastal uplands and a belt of Brigalow grasslands lie between the coast and the mountains, while inland of the dividing range are large areas of grassland and shrubland. These include the western plains of New South Wales, and the Mitchell Grass Downs and Mulga Lands of inland Queensland. The northernmost point of the mainland is the tropical Cape York Peninsula.The landscapes of the Top End and the Gulf Country—with their tropical climate—include forest, woodland, wetland, grassland, rainforest and desert. At the north-west corner of the continent are the sandstone cliffs and gorges of The Kimberley, and below that the Pilbara. The Victoria Plains tropical savanna lies south of the Kimberly and Arnhem Land savannas, forming a transition between the coastal savannas and the interior deserts. At the heart of the country are the uplands of central Australia. Prominent features of the centre and south include Uluru (also known as Ayers Rock), the famous sandstone monolith, and the inland Simpson, Tirari and Sturt Stony, Gibson, Great Sandy, Tanami, and Great Victoria deserts, with the famous Nullarbor Plain on the southern coast. The Western Australian mulga shrublands lie between the interior deserts and Mediterranean-climate Southwest Australia.Lying on the Indo-Australian Plate, the mainland of Australia is the lowest and most primordial landmass on Earth with a relatively stable geological history. The landmass includes virtually all known rock types and from all geological time periods spanning over 3.8 billion years of the Earth's history. The Pilbara Craton is one of only two pristine Archaean 3.6–2.7 Ga (billion years ago) crusts identified on the Earth.Having been part of all major supercontinents, the Australian continent began to form after the breakup of Gondwana in the Permian, with the separation of the continental landmass from the African continent and Indian subcontinent. It separated from Antarctica over a prolonged period beginning in the Permian and continuing through to the Cretaceous. When the last glacial period ended in about 10,000 BC, rising sea levels formed Bass Strait, separating Tasmania from the mainland. Then between about 8,000 and 6,500 BC, the lowlands in the north were flooded by the sea, separating New Guinea, the Aru Islands, and the mainland of Australia. The Australian continent is moving toward Eurasia at the rate of 6 to 7 centimetres a year.The Australian mainland's continental crust, excluding the thinned margins, has an average thickness of 38km, with a range in thickness from 24 km to 59 km. Australia's geology can be divided into several main sections, showcasing that the continent grew from west to east: the Archaean cratonic shields found mostly in the west, Proterozoic fold belts in the centre and Phanerozoic sedimentary basins, metamorphic and igneous rocks in the east.The Australian mainland and Tasmania are situated in the middle of the tectonic plate and have no active volcanoes, but due to passing over the East Australia hotspot, recent volcanism has occurred during the Holocene, in the Newer Volcanics Province of western Victoria and southeastern South Australia. Volcanism also occurs in the island of New Guinea (considered geologically as part of the Australian continent), and in the Australian external territory of Heard Island and McDonald Islands. Seismic activity in the Australian mainland and Tasmania is also low, with the greatest number of fatalities having occurred in the 1989 Newcastle earthquake.The climate of Australia is significantly influenced by ocean currents, including the Indian Ocean Dipole and the El Niño–Southern Oscillation, which is correlated with periodic drought, and the seasonal tropical low-pressure system that produces cyclones in northern Australia. These factors cause rainfall to vary markedly from year to year. Much of the northern part of the country has a tropical, predominantly summer-rainfall (monsoon). The south-west corner of the country has a Mediterranean climate. The south-east ranges from oceanic (Tasmania and coastal Victoria) to humid subtropical (upper half of New South Wales), with the highlands featuring alpine and subpolar oceanic climates. The interior is arid to semi-arid.Driven by climate change, average temperatures have risen more than 1°C since 1960. Associated changes in rainfall patterns and climate extremes exacerbate existing issues such as drought and bushfires. 2019 was Australia's warmest recorded year, and the 2019–2020 bushfire season was the country's worst on record. Australia's greenhouse gas emissions per capita are among the highest in the world.Water restrictions are frequently in place in many regions and cities of Australia in response to chronic shortages due to urban population increases and localised drought. Throughout much of the continent, major flooding regularly follows extended periods of drought, flushing out inland river systems, overflowing dams and inundating large inland flood plains, as occurred throughout Eastern Australia in the early 2010s after the 2000s Australian drought.Although most of Australia is semi-arid or desert, the continent includes a diverse range of habitats from alpine heaths to tropical rainforests. Fungi typify that diversity—an estimated 250,000 species—of which only 5% have been described—occur in Australia. Because of the continent's great age, extremely variable weather patterns, and long-term geographic isolation, much of Australia's biota is unique. About 85% of flowering plants, 84% of mammals, more than 45% of birds, and 89% of in-shore, temperate-zone fish are endemic. Australia has at least 755 species of reptile, more than any other country in the world. Besides Antarctica, Australia is the only continent that developed without feline species. Feral cats may have been introduced in the 17th century by Dutch shipwrecks, and later in the 18th century by European settlers. They are now considered a major factor in the decline and extinction of many vulnerable and endangered native species. Australia is also one of 17 megadiverse countries.Australian forests are mostly made up of evergreen species, particularly eucalyptus trees in the less arid regions; wattles replace them as the dominant species in drier regions and deserts. Among well-known Australian animals are the monotremes (the platypus and echidna); a host of marsupials, including the kangaroo, koala, and wombat, and birds such as the emu and the kookaburra. Australia is home to many dangerous animals including some of the most venomous snakes in the world. The dingo was introduced by Austronesian people who traded with Indigenous Australians around 3000 BCE. Many animal and plant species became extinct soon after first human settlement, including the Australian megafauna; others have disappeared since European settlement, among them the thylacine.Many of Australia's ecoregions, and the species within those regions, are threatened by human activities and introduced animal, chromistan, fungal and plant species. All these factors have led to Australia's having the highest mammal extinction rate of any country in the world. The federal "Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999" is the legal framework for the protection of threatened species. Numerous protected areas have been created under the National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia's Biological Diversity to protect and preserve unique ecosystems; 65 wetlands are listed under the Ramsar Convention, and 16 natural World Heritage Sites have been established. Australia was ranked 21st out of 178 countries in the world on the 2018 Environmental Performance Index. There are more than 1,800 animals and plants on Australia's threatened species list, including more than 500 animals.Australia is a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy. The country has maintained a stable liberal democratic political system under its constitution, which is one of the world's oldest, since Federation in 1901. It is also one of the world's oldest federations, in which power is divided between the federal and state and territorial governments. The Australian system of government combines elements derived from the political systems of the United Kingdom (a fused executive, constitutional monarchy and strong party discipline) and the United States (federalism, a written constitution and strong bicameralism with an elected upper house), along with distinctive indigenous features.The federal government is separated into three branches:Elizabeth II reigns as Queen of Australia and is represented in Australia by the governor-general at the federal level and by the governors at the state level, who by convention act on the advice of her ministers. Thus, in practice the governor-general acts as a legal figurehead for the actions of the prime minister and the Federal Executive Council. The governor-general does have extraordinary reserve powers which may be exercised outside the prime minister's request in rare and limited circumstances, the most notable exercise of which was the dismissal of the Whitlam Government in the constitutional crisis of 1975.In the Senate (the upper house), there are 76 senators: twelve each from the states and two each from the mainland territories (the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory). The House of Representatives (the lower house) has 151 members elected from single-member electoral divisions, commonly known as "electorates" or "seats", allocated to states on the basis of population, with each original state guaranteed a minimum of five seats. Elections for both chambers are normally held every three years simultaneously; senators have overlapping six-year terms except for those from the territories, whose terms are not fixed but are tied to the electoral cycle for the lower house; thus only 40 of the 76 places in the Senate are put to each election unless the cycle is interrupted by a double dissolution.Australia's electoral system uses preferential voting for all lower house elections with the exception of Tasmania and the ACT which, along with the Senate and most state upper houses, combine it with proportional representation in a system known as the single transferable vote. Voting is compulsory for all enrolled citizens 18 years and over in every jurisdiction, as is enrolment. The party with majority support in the House of Representatives forms the government and its leader becomes Prime Minister. In cases where no party has majority support, the Governor-General has the constitutional power to appoint the Prime Minister and, if necessary, dismiss one that has lost the confidence of Parliament. Due to the relatively unique position of Australia operating as a Westminster Parliamentary democracy with an elected upper house, the system has sometimes been referred to as having a "Washminster mutation", or as a Semi-parliamentary system. There are two major political groups that usually form government, federally and in the states: the Australian Labor Party and the Coalition which is a formal grouping of the Liberal Party and its minor partner, the National Party. Within Australian political culture, the Coalition is considered centre-right and the Labor Party is considered centre-left. Independent members and several minor parties have achieved representation in Australian parliaments, mostly in upper houses. The Australian Greens are often considered the "third force" in politics, being the third largest party by both vote and membership.The most recent federal election was held on 18 May 2019 and resulted in the Coalition, led by Prime Minister Scott Morrison, retaining government.Australia has six states — New South Wales (NSW), Queensland (QLD), South Australia (SA), Tasmania (TAS), Victoria (VIC) and Western Australia (WA) — and two major mainland territories—the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and the Northern Territory (NT). In most respects, these two territories function as states, except that the Commonwealth Parliament has the power to modify or repeal any legislation passed by the territory parliaments.Under the constitution, the states essentially have plenary legislative power to legislate on any subject, whereas the Commonwealth (federal) Parliament may legislate only within the subject areas enumerated under section 51. For example, state parliaments have the power to legislate with respect to education, criminal law and state police, health, transport, and local government, but the Commonwealth Parliament does not have any specific power to legislate in these areas. However, Commonwealth laws prevail over state laws to the extent of the inconsistency.Each state and major mainland territory has its own parliament — unicameral in the Northern Territory, the ACT and Queensland, and bicameral in the other states. The states are sovereign entities, although subject to certain powers of the Commonwealth as defined by the Constitution. The lower houses are known as the Legislative Assembly (the House of Assembly in South Australia and Tasmania); the upper houses are known as the Legislative Council. The head of the government in each state is the Premier and in each territory the Chief Minister. The Queen is represented in each state by a governor; and in the Northern Territory, the administrator. In the Commonwealth, the Queen's representative is the governor-general.The Commonwealth Parliament also directly administers the external territories of Ashmore and Cartier Islands, Christmas Island, the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, the Coral Sea Islands, Heard Island and McDonald Islands, and the claimed region of Australian Antarctic Territory, as well as the internal Jervis Bay Territory, a naval base and sea port for the national capital in land that was formerly part of New South Wales. The external territory of Norfolk Island previously exercised considerable autonomy under the "Norfolk Island Act 1979" through its own legislative assembly and an Administrator to represent the Queen. In 2015, the Commonwealth Parliament abolished self-government, integrating Norfolk Island into the Australian tax and welfare systems and replacing its legislative assembly with a council. Macquarie Island is part of Tasmania, and Lord Howe Island of New South Wales.Over recent decades, Australia's foreign relations have been driven by a close association with the United States through the ANZUS pact, and by a desire to develop relationships with Asia and the Pacific, particularly through Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Pacific Islands Forum and the Pacific Community, of which Australia is a founding member. In 2005, Australia secured an inaugural seat at the East Asia Summit following its accession to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, and in 2011 attended the Sixth East Asia Summit in Indonesia. Australia is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, in which the Commonwealth Heads of Government meetings provide the main forum for co-operation. Australia has pursued the cause of international trade liberalisation. It led the formation of the Cairns Group and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.Australia is a member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), and has pursued several major bilateral free trade agreements, most recently the Australia–United States Free Trade Agreement and Closer Economic Relations with New Zealand, with another free trade agreement being negotiated with China — the Australia–China Free Trade Agreement — and Japan, South Korea in 2011, Australia–Chile Free Trade Agreement, and has put the Trans-Pacific Partnership before parliament for ratification.Australia maintains a deeply integrated relationship with neighbouring New Zealand, with free mobility of citizens between the two countries under the Trans-Tasman Travel Arrangement and free trade under the Australia–New Zealand Closer Economic Relations Trade Agreement. New Zealand, Canada and the United Kingdom are the most favourably viewed countries in the world by Australian people.Along with New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Malaysia and Singapore, Australia is party to the Five Power Defence Arrangements, a regional defence agreement. A founding member country of the United Nations, Australia is strongly committed to multilateralism and maintains an international aid program under which some 60 countries receive assistance. The 2005–2006 budget provides AU$2.5 billion for development assistance. Australia ranks fifteenth overall in the Center for Global Development's 2012 Commitment to Development Index.Australia's armed forces—the Australian Defence Force (ADF) — comprise the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), the Australian Army and the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), in total numbering 81,214 personnel (including 57,982 regulars and 23,232 reservists) . The titular role of Commander-in-Chief is vested in the Governor-General, who appoints a Chief of the Defence Force from one of the armed services on the advice of the government. In a diarchy, the CDF serves as co-chairman of the Defence Committee, conjointly with the Secretary of Defence, in the command and control of the Australian Defence Organisation.In the 2016–2017 budget, defence spending comprised 2% of GDP, representing the world's 12th largest defence budget. Australia has been involved in United Nations and regional peacekeeping, disaster relief and armed conflict, including the 2003 invasion of Iraq; Australia currently has deployed about 2,241 personnel in varying capacities to 12 international operations in areas including Iraq and Afghanistan.A wealthy country, Australia has a market economy, a high GDP per capita, and a relatively low rate of poverty. In terms of average wealth, Australia ranked second in the world after Switzerland from 2013 until 2018. In 2018, Australia overtook Switzerland and became the country with the highest average wealth. Australia's relative poverty rate is 13.6%. It was identified by the Credit Suisse Research Institute as the nation with the highest median wealth in the world and the second-highest average wealth per adult in 2013.The Australian dollar is the currency for the nation, including Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and Norfolk Island, as well as the independent Pacific Island states of Kiribati, Nauru, and Tuvalu. With the 2006 merger of the Australian Stock Exchange and the Sydney Futures Exchange, the Australian Securities Exchange became the ninth largest in the world.Ranked fifth in the Index of Economic Freedom (2017), Australia is the world's 13th largest economy and has the tenth highest per capita GDP (nominal) at US$55,692. The country was ranked third in the United Nations 2017 Human Development Index. Melbourne reached top spot for the fourth year in a row on "The Economist"s 2014 list of the world's most liveable cities, followed by Adelaide, Sydney, and Perth in the fifth, seventh, and ninth places respectively. Total government debt in Australia is about A$190 billion—20% of GDP in 2010. Australia has among the highest house prices and some of the highest household debt levels in the world.An emphasis on exporting commodities rather than manufactured goods has underpinned a significant increase in Australia's terms of trade since the start of the 21st century, due to rising commodity prices. Australia has a balance of payments that is more than 7% of GDP negative, and has had persistently large current account deficits for more than 50 years. Australia has grown at an average annual rate of 3.6% for over 15 years, in comparison to the OECD annual average of 2.5%.Australia was the only advanced economy not to experience a recession due to the global financial downturn in 2008–2009. However, the economies of six of Australia's major trading partners were in recession, which in turn affected Australia, significantly hampering its economic growth. From 2012 to early 2013, Australia's national economy grew, but some non-mining states and Australia's non-mining economy experienced a recession.The Hawke Government floated the Australian dollar in 1983 and partially deregulated the financial system. The Howard Government followed with a partial deregulation of the labour market and the further privatisation of state-owned businesses, most notably in the telecommunications industry. The indirect tax system was substantially changed in July 2000 with the introduction of a 10% Goods and Services Tax (GST). In Australia's tax system, personal and company income tax are the main sources of government revenue., there were 12,640,800 people employed (either full- or part-time), with an unemployment rate of 5.2%. Data released in mid-November 2013 showed that the number of welfare recipients had grown by 55%. In 2007 228,621 Newstart unemployment allowance recipients were registered, a total that increased to 646,414 in March 2013. According to the Graduate Careers Survey, full-time employment for newly qualified professionals from various occupations has declined since 2011 but it increases for graduates three years after graduation.Access to biocapacity in Australia is much higher than world average. In 2016, Australia had 12.3 global hectares of biocapacity per person within its territory, much more than the world average of 1.6 global hectares per person. In 2016 Australia used 6.6 global hectares of biocapacity per person – their ecological footprint of consumption. This means they use half as much biocapacity as Australia contains. As a result, Australia is running a biocapacity reserve.In 2020 the Australian Council of Social Service released a report stating that relative poverty was growing in Australia, with an estimated 3.2 million people, or 13.6% of the population, living below an internationally accepted relative poverty threshold of 50% of a country's median income. It also estimated that there were 774,000 (17.7%) children under the age of 15 in relative poverty.Australia has an average population density of / 7682300 round 1 persons per square kilometre of total land area, which makes it one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world. The population is heavily concentrated on the east coast, and in particular in the south-eastern region between South East Queensland to the north-east and Adelaide to the south-west.Australia is highly urbanised, with 67% of the population living in the Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (metropolitan areas of the state and mainland territorial capital cities) in 2018. Metropolitan areas with more than one million inhabitants are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.In common with many other developed countries, Australia is experiencing a demographic shift towards an older population, with more retirees and fewer people of working age. In 2018 the average age of the Australian population was 38.8 years. In 2015, 2.15% of the Australian population lived overseas, one of the worldwide.Between 1788 and the Second World War, the vast majority of settlers and immigrants came from the British Isles (principally England, Ireland and Scotland), although there was significant immigration from China and Germany during the 19th century. In the decades immediately following the Second World War, Australia received a large wave of immigration from across Europe, with many more immigrants arriving from Southern and Eastern Europe than in previous decades. Since the end of the White Australia policy in 1973, Australia has pursued an official policy of multiculturalism, and there has been a large and continuing wave of immigration from across the world, with Asia being the largest source of immigrants in the 21st century.Today, Australia has the world's eighth-largest immigrant population, with immigrants accounting for 30% of the population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. 160,323 permanent immigrants were admitted to Australia in 2018–2019 (excluding refugees), whilst there was a net population gain of 239,600 people from all permanent and temporary immigration in that year. The majority of immigrants are skilled, but the immigration program includes categories for family members and refugees. In 2020, the largest foreign-born populations were those born in England (3.8%), India (2.8%), Mainland China (2.5%), New Zealand (2.2%), the Philippines (1.2%) and Vietnam (1.1%).In the 2016 Australian census, the most commonly nominated ancestries were: At the 2016 census, 649,171 people (2.8% of the total population) identified as being Indigenous — Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders. Indigenous Australians experience higher than average rates of imprisonment and unemployment, lower levels of education, and life expectancies for males and females that are, respectively, 11 and 17 years lower than those of non-indigenous Australians. Some remote Indigenous communities have been described as having "failed state"-like conditions.Although Australia has no official language, English is the "de facto" national language. Australian English is a major variety of the language with a distinctive accent and lexicon, and differs slightly from other varieties of English in grammar and spelling. General Australian serves as the standard dialect.According to the 2016 census, English is the only language spoken in the home for 72.7% of the population. The next most common languages spoken at home are Mandarin (2.5%), Arabic (1.4%), Cantonese (1.2%), Vietnamese (1.2%) and Italian (1.2%). Over 250 Indigenous Australian languages are thought to have existed at the time of first European contact, of which fewer than twenty are still in daily use by all age groups. About 110 others are spoken exclusively by older people. At the time of the 2006 census, 52,000 Indigenous Australians, representing 12% of the Indigenous population, reported that they spoke an Indigenous language at home. Australia has a sign language known as Auslan, which is the main language of about 10,112 deaf people who reported that they spoke Auslan language at home in the 2016 census.Australia has no state religion; Section 116 of the Australian Constitution prohibits the federal government from making any law to establish any religion, impose any religious observance, or prohibit the free exercise of any religion. In the 2016 census, 52.1% of Australians were counted as Christian, including 22.6% as Catholic and 13.3% as Anglican; 30.1% of the population reported having "no religion"; 8.2% identify with non-Christian religions, the largest of these being Islam (2.6%), followed by Buddhism (2.4%), Hinduism (1.9%), Sikhism (0.5%) and Judaism (0.4%). The remaining 9.7% of the population did not provide an adequate answer. Those who reported having no religion increased conspicuously from 19% in 2006 to 22% in 2011 to 30.1% in 2016.Before European settlement, the animist beliefs of Australia's indigenous people had been practised for many thousands of years. Mainland Aboriginal Australians' spirituality is known as the Dreaming and it places a heavy emphasis on belonging to the land. The collection of stories that it contains shaped Aboriginal law and customs. Aboriginal art, story and dance continue to draw on these spiritual traditions. The spirituality and customs of Torres Strait Islanders, who inhabit the islands between Australia and New Guinea, reflected their Melanesian origins and dependence on the sea. The 1996 Australian census counted more than 7000 respondents as followers of a traditional Aboriginal religion.Since the arrival of the First Fleet of British ships in 1788, Christianity has become the major religion practised in Australia. Christian churches have played an integral role in the development of education, health and welfare services in Australia. For much of Australian history, the Church of England (now known as the Anglican Church of Australia) was the largest religious denomination, with a large Roman Catholic minority. However, multicultural immigration has contributed to a steep decline in its relative position since the Second World War. Similarly, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism and Judaism have all grown in Australia over the past half-century.Australia has one of the lowest levels of religious adherence in the world. In 2018, 13% of women and 10% of men reported attending church at least weekly.Australia's life expectancy is the fourth highest in the world for males and the third highest for females. Life expectancy in Australia in 2014–2016 was 80.4 years for males and 84.6 years for females. Australia has the highest rates of skin cancer in the world, while cigarette smoking is the largest preventable cause of death and disease, responsible for 7.8% of the total mortality and disease. Ranked second in preventable causes is hypertension at 7.6%, with obesity third at 7.5%. Australia ranks 35th in the world and near the top of developed nations for its proportion of obese adults and nearly two thirds (63%) of its adult population is either overweight or obese.Total expenditure on health (including private sector spending) is around 9.8% of GDP. Australia introduced universal health care in 1975. Known as Medicare, it is now nominally funded by an income tax surcharge known as the Medicare levy, currently at 2%. The states manage hospitals and attached outpatient services, while the Commonwealth funds the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (subsidising the costs of medicines) and general practice.School attendance, or registration for home schooling, is compulsory throughout Australia. Education is the responsibility of the individual states and territories so the rules vary between states, but in general children are required to attend school from the age of about 5 until about 16. In some states (e.g., Western Australia, the Northern Territory and New South Wales), children aged 16–17 are required to either attend school or participate in vocational training, such as an apprenticeship.Australia has an adult literacy rate that was estimated to be 99% in 2003. However, a 2011–2012 report for the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that Tasmania has a literacy and numeracy rate of only 50%.Australia has 37 government-funded universities and three private universities, as well as a number of other specialist institutions that provide approved courses at the higher education level. The OECD places Australia among the most expensive nations to attend university. There is a state-based system of vocational training, known as TAFE, and many trades conduct apprenticeships for training new tradespeople. About 58% of Australians aged from 25 to 64 have vocational or tertiary qualifications, and the tertiary graduation rate of 49% is the highest among OECD countries. 30.9% of Australia's population has attained a higher education qualification, which is among the highest percentages in the world.Australia has the highest ratio of international students per head of population in the world by a large margin, with 812,000 international students enrolled in the nation's universities and vocational institutions in 2019. Accordingly, in 2019, international students represented on average 26.7% of the student bodies of Australian universities. International education therefore represents one of the country's largest exports and has a pronounced influence on the country's demographics, with a significant proportion of international students remaining in Australia after graduation on various skill and employment visas.In 2003, Australia's energy sources were coal (58.4%), hydropower (19.1%), natural gas (13.5%), liquid/gas fossil fuel-switching plants (5.4%), oil (2.9%), and other renewable resources like wind power, solar energy, and bioenergy (0.7%). During the 21st century, Australia has been trending to generate more energy using renewable resources and less energy using fossil fuels. In 2020, Australia used coal for 62% of all energy (3.6% increase compared to 2013), wind power for 9.9% (9.5% increase), natural gas for 9.9% (3.6% decrease), solar power for 9.9% (9.8% increase), hydropower for 6.4% (12.7% decrease), bioenergy for 1.4% (1.2% increase), and other sources like oil and waste coal mine gas for 0.5%.In August 2009, Australia's government set a goal to achieve 20% of all energy in the country from renewable sources by 2020. They achieved this goal, as renewable resources accounted for 27.7% of Australia's energy in 2020.Since 1788, the primary influence behind Australian culture has been Anglo-Celtic Western culture, with some Indigenous influences. The divergence and evolution that has occurred in the ensuing centuries has resulted in a distinctive Australian culture. The culture of the United States has served as a significant influence, particularly through television and cinema. Other cultural influences come from neighbouring Asian countries, and through large-scale immigration from non-English-speaking nations.Australia has over 100,000 Aboriginal rock art sites, and traditional designs, patterns and stories infuse contemporary Indigenous Australian art, "the last great art movement of the 20th century" according to critic Robert Hughes; its exponents include Emily Kame Kngwarreye. Early colonial artists showed a fascination with the unfamiliar land. The impressionistic works of Arthur Streeton, Tom Roberts and other members of the 19th-century Heidelberg School—the first "distinctively Australian" movement in Western art—gave expression to nationalist sentiments in the lead-up to Federation. While the school remained influential into the 1900s, modernists such as Margaret Preston, and, later, Sidney Nolan and Arthur Boyd, explored new artistic trends. The landscape remained a central subject matter for Fred Williams, Brett Whiteley and other post-war artists whose works, eclectic in style yet uniquely Australian, moved between the figurative and the abstract. The national and state galleries maintain collections of local and international art. Australia has one of the world's highest attendances of art galleries and museums per head of population.Australian literature grew slowly in the decades following European settlement though Indigenous oral traditions, many of which have since been recorded in writing, are much older. In the 1870s, Adam Lindsay Gordon posthumously became the first Australian poet to attain a wide readership. Following in his footsteps, Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson captured the experience of the bush using a distinctive Australian vocabulary. Their works are still popular; Paterson's bush poem "Waltzing Matilda" (1895) is regarded as Australia's unofficial national anthem. Miles Franklin is the namesake of Australia's most prestigious literary prize, awarded annually to the best novel about Australian life. Its first recipient, Patrick White, went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1973. Australian Booker Prize winners include Peter Carey, Thomas Keneally and Richard Flanagan. Authors David Malouf, Germaine Greer, Helen Garner, playwright David Williamson and poet Les Murray are also renowned.Many of Australia's performing arts companies receive funding through the federal government's Australia Council. There is a symphony orchestra in each state, and a national opera company, Opera Australia, well known for its famous soprano Joan Sutherland. At the beginning of the 20th century, Nellie Melba was one of the world's leading opera singers. Ballet and dance are represented by The Australian Ballet and various state companies. Each state has a publicly funded theatre company."The Story of the Kelly Gang" (1906), the world's first feature-length narrative film, spurred a boom in Australian cinema during the silent film era. After World War I, Hollywood monopolised the industry, and by the 1960s Australian film production had effectively ceased. With the benefit of government support, the Australian New Wave of the 1970s brought provocative and successful films, many exploring themes of national identity, such as "Wake in Fright" and "Gallipoli", while "Crocodile Dundee" and the Ozploitation movement's "Mad Max" series became international blockbusters. In a film market flooded with foreign content, Australian films delivered a 7.7% share of the local box office in 2015. The AACTAs are Australia's premier film and television awards, and notable Academy Award winners from Australia include Geoffrey Rush, Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett and Heath Ledger.Australia has two public broadcasters (the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the multicultural Special Broadcasting Service), three commercial television networks, several pay-TV services, and numerous public, non-profit television and radio stations. Each major city has at least one daily newspaper, and there are two national daily newspapers, "The Australian" and "The Australian Financial Review". In 2010, Reporters Without Borders placed Australia 18th on a list of 178 countries ranked by press freedom, behind New Zealand (8th) but ahead of the United Kingdom (19th) and United States (20th). This relatively low ranking is primarily because of the limited diversity of commercial media ownership in Australia; most print media are under the control of News Corporation and, after Fairfax Media was merged with Nine, Nine Entertainment Co.Most Indigenous Australian groups subsisted on a simple hunter-gatherer diet of native fauna and flora, otherwise called bush tucker. The first settlers introduced British food to the continent, much of which is now considered typical Australian food, such as the Sunday roast. Multicultural immigration transformed Australian cuisine; post-World War II European migrants, particularly from the Mediterranean, helped to build a thriving Australian coffee culture, and the influence of Asian cultures has led to Australian variants of their staple foods, such as the Chinese-inspired dim sim and Chiko Roll. Vegemite, pavlova, lamingtons and meat pies are regarded as iconic Australian foods.Australian wine is produced mainly in the southern, cooler parts of the country. Australia is also known for its cafe and coffee culture in urban centres, which has influenced coffee culture abroad, including New York City. Australia was responsible for the flat white coffee–purported to have originated in a Sydney cafe in the mid-1980s.Cricket and football are the predominate sports in Australia during the summer and winter months, respectively. Australia is unique in that it has professional leagues for four football codes. Originating in Melbourne in the 1850s, Australian rules football is the most popular code in all states except New South Wales and Queensland, where rugby league holds sway, followed by rugby union; the imaginary border separating areas where Australian rules football dominates from those were the two rugby codes prevail is known as the Barassi Line. Soccer, while ranked fourth in popularity and resources, has the highest overall participation rates. Cricket is popular across all borders and has been regarded by many Australians as the national sport. The Australian national cricket team competed against England in the first Test match (1877) and the first One Day International (1971), and against New Zealand in the first Twenty20 International (2004), winning all three games. It has also participated in every edition of the Cricket World Cup, winning the tournament a record five times.Australia is also notable for water-based sports, such as swimming and surfing. The surf lifesaving movement originated in Australia, and the volunteer lifesaver is one of the country's icons. Nationally, other popular sports include horse racing, basketball, and motor racing. The annual Melbourne Cup horse race and the Sydney to Hobart yacht race attract intense interest. In 2016, the Australian Sports Commission revealed that swimming, cycling and soccer are the three most popular participation sports.Australia is one of five nations to have participated in every Summer Olympics of the modern era, and has hosted the Games twice: 1956 in Melbourne and 2000 in Sydney. Australia has also participated in every Commonwealth Games, hosting the event in 1938, 1962, 1982, 2006 and 2018. Australia made its inaugural appearance at the Pacific Games in 2015. As well as being a regular FIFA World Cup participant, Australia has won the OFC Nations Cup four times and the AFC Asian Cup once—the only country to have won championships in two different FIFA confederations. In June 2020, Australia won its bid to co-host the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup with New Zealand. The country regularly competes among the world elite basketball teams as it is among the global top three teams in terms of qualifications to the Basketball Tournament at the Summer Olympics. Other major international events held in Australia include the Australian Open tennis grand slam tournament, international cricket matches, and the Australian Formula One Grand Prix. The highest-rating television programs include sports telecasts such as the Summer Olympics, FIFA World Cup, The Ashes, Rugby League State of Origin, and the grand finals of the National Rugby League and Australian Football League. Skiing in Australia began in the 1860s and snow sports take place in the Australian Alps and parts of Tasmania.
|
[
"Billy Hughes",
"Gough Whitlam",
"Malcolm Fraser",
"Joseph Cook",
"George Reid",
"John McEwen",
"Scott Morrison",
"Arthur Fadden",
"Malcolm Turnbull",
"Robert Menzies",
"Andrew Fisher",
"Harold Holt",
"Earle Page",
"John Howard",
"Edmund Barton",
"Frank Forde",
"Kevin Rudd",
"Tony Abbott",
"Ben Chifley",
"William McMahon",
"Paul Keating",
"Julia Gillard",
"Chris Watson",
"Anthony Albanese",
"Stanley Bruce",
"John Gorton",
"James Scullin",
"Bob Hawke",
"Alfred Deakin",
"John Curtin"
] |
|
Who was the head of Australia in 05-Nov-193705-November-1937?
|
November 05, 1937
|
{
"text": [
"Joseph Lyons"
]
}
|
L2_Q408_P6_9
|
Arthur Fadden is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1941 to Oct, 1941.
James Scullin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1929 to Jan, 1932.
Edmund Barton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1901 to Sep, 1903.
Tony Abbott is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2013 to Sep, 2015.
Joseph Lyons is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1932 to Apr, 1939.
John McEwen is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1967 to Jan, 1968.
Alfred Deakin is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1905 to Nov, 1908.
Julia Gillard is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 2010 to Jun, 2013.
Chris Watson is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1904 to Aug, 1904.
Andrew Fisher is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1908 to Jun, 1909.
Scott Morrison is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 2018 to May, 2022.
John Gorton is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1968 to Mar, 1971.
Robert Menzies is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1949 to Jan, 1966.
Frank Forde is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Jul, 1945.
Ben Chifley is the head of the government of Australia from Jul, 1945 to Dec, 1949.
Malcolm Turnbull is the head of the government of Australia from Sep, 2015 to Aug, 2018.
Bob Hawke is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1983 to Dec, 1991.
Billy Hughes is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1915 to Feb, 1923.
Joseph Cook is the head of the government of Australia from Jun, 1913 to Sep, 1914.
John Howard is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1996 to Mar, 2007.
John Curtin is the head of the government of Australia from Oct, 1941 to Jul, 1945.
Harold Holt is the head of the government of Australia from Jan, 1966 to Dec, 1967.
Malcolm Fraser is the head of the government of Australia from Nov, 1975 to Mar, 1983.
Anthony Albanese is the head of the government of Australia from May, 2022 to Dec, 2022.
Kevin Rudd is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 2007 to Jun, 2010.
George Reid is the head of the government of Australia from Aug, 1904 to Jul, 1905.
Stanley Bruce is the head of the government of Australia from Feb, 1923 to Oct, 1929.
Paul Keating is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1991 to Mar, 1996.
Gough Whitlam is the head of the government of Australia from Dec, 1972 to Nov, 1975.
William McMahon is the head of the government of Australia from Mar, 1971 to Dec, 1972.
Earle Page is the head of the government of Australia from Apr, 1939 to Apr, 1939.
|
AustraliaAustralia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia's population of nearly / 1000000 round 0 million, in an area of , is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Canberra is the nation's capital, while the largest city is Sydney, and other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide.Indigenous Australians inhabited the continent for about 65,000 years, prior to the first arrival of Dutch explorers in the early 17th century, who named it New Holland. In 1770, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain and initially settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788, a date which became Australia's national day. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the time of an 1850s gold rush, most of the continent had been explored by European settlers and an additional five self-governing crown colonies established. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy, comprising six states and ten territories.Australia is the oldest, flattest, and driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It is a megadiverse country, and its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes and climates, with deserts in the centre, tropical rainforests in the north-east, and mountain ranges in the south-east. Australia generates its income from various sources, including mining-related exports, telecommunications, banking, manufacturing, and international education.Australia is a highly developed country, with the world's twelfth-largest economy. It has a high-income economy, with the world's tenth-highest per capita income. Australia is a regional power, and has the world's thirteenth-highest military expenditure. Immigrants account for 30% of the country's population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. Having the eight-highest Human Development Index, and the ninth-highest ranked democracy globally as of 2020, Australia ranks highly in quality of life, health, education, economic freedom, civil liberties, and political rights, with all its major cities faring exceptionally in global comparative livability surveys. It is a member of the United Nations, the G20, the Commonwealth of Nations, the ANZUS, the OECD, the WTO, the APEC, the Pacific Islands Forum, the Pacific Community and the ASEAN + 6 mechanism.The name "Australia" (pronounced in Australian English) is derived from the Latin "Terra Australis" ("southern land"), a name used for a hypothetical continent in the Southern Hemisphere since ancient times. When Europeans first began visiting and mapping Australia in the 17th century, the name "Terra Australis" was naturally applied to the new territories.Until the early 19th century, Australia was best known as "New Holland", a name first applied by the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman in 1644 (as "Nieuw-Holland") and subsequently anglicised. "Terra Australis" still saw occasional usage, such as in scientific texts. The name "Australia" was popularised by the explorer Matthew Flinders, who said it was "more agreeable to the ear, and an assimilation to the names of the other great portions of the Earth". Several famous early cartographers also made use of the word Australia on maps. Gerardus Mercator used the phrase "climata " on his double cordiform map of the world of 1538, as did Gemma Frisius, who was Mercator's teacher and collaborator, on his own cordiform wall map in 1540. Australia appears in a book on astronomy by Cyriaco Jacob zum Barth published in Frankfurt am Main in 1545.The first time that "Australia" appears to have been officially used was in April 1817, when Governor Lachlan Macquarie acknowledged the receipt of Flinders' charts of Australia from Lord Bathurst. In December 1817, Macquarie recommended to the Colonial Office that it be formally adopted. In 1824, the Admiralty agreed that the continent should be known officially by that name. The first official published use of the new name came with the publication in 1830 of "The Australia Directory" by the Hydrographic Office.Colloquial names for Australia include "Oz" and "the Land Down Under" (usually shortened to just "Down Under"). Other epithets include "the Great Southern Land", "the Lucky Country", "the Sunburnt Country", and "the Wide Brown Land". The latter two both derive from Dorothea Mackellar's 1908 poem "My Country".Human habitation of the Australian continent is known to have begun at least 65,000 years ago, with the migration of people by land bridges and short sea-crossings from what is now Southeast Asia. The Madjedbebe rock shelter in Arnhem Land is recognised as the oldest site showing the presence of humans in Australia. The oldest human remains found are the Lake Mungo remains, which have been dated to around 41,000 years ago. These people were the ancestors of modern Indigenous Australians. Aboriginal Australian culture is one of the oldest continual cultures on Earth.At the time of first European contact, most Indigenous Australians were hunter-gatherers with complex economies and societies. Recent archaeological finds suggest that a population of 750,000 could have been sustained. Indigenous Australians have an oral culture with spiritual values based on reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime. The Torres Strait Islanders, ethnically Melanesian, obtained their livelihood from seasonal horticulture and the resources of their reefs and seas. The northern coasts and waters of Australia were visited sporadically by Makassan fishermen from what is now Indonesia.The first recorded European sighting of the Australian mainland, and the first recorded European landfall on the Australian continent, are attributed to the Dutch. The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the "Duyfken" captained by Dutch navigator, Willem Janszoon. He sighted the coast of Cape York Peninsula in early 1606, and made landfall on 26 February 1606 at the Pennefather River near the modern town of Weipa on Cape York. Later that year, Spanish explorer Luís Vaz de Torres sailed through, and navigated, Torres Strait islands. The Dutch charted the whole of the western and northern coastlines and named the island continent "New Holland" during the 17th century, and although no attempt at settlement was made, a number of shipwrecks left men either stranded or, as in the case of the "Batavia" in 1629, marooned for mutiny and murder, thus becoming the first Europeans to permanently inhabit the continent. William Dampier, an English explorer and privateer, landed on the north-west coast of New Holland in 1688 (while serving as a crewman under pirate Captain John Read) and again in 1699 on a return trip. In 1770, James Cook sailed along and mapped the east coast, which he named New South Wales and claimed for Great Britain.With the loss of its American colonies in 1783, the British Government sent a fleet of ships, the "First Fleet", under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip, to establish a new penal colony in New South Wales. A camp was set up and the Union flag raised at Sydney Cove, Port Jackson, on 26 January 1788, a date which later became Australia's national day, Australia Day. Most early convicts were transported for petty crimes and assigned as labourers or servants upon arrival. While the majority settled into colonial society once emancipated, convict rebellions and uprisings were also staged, but invariably suppressed under martial law. The 1808 Rum Rebellion, the only successful armed takeover of government in Australia, instigated a two-year period of military rule.The indigenous population declined for 150 years following settlement, mainly due to infectious disease. Thousands more died as a result of frontier conflict with settlers. A government policy of "assimilation" beginning with the "Aboriginal Protection Act 1869" resulted in the removal of many Aboriginal children from their families and communities—referred to as the Stolen Generations — a practice which also contributed to the decline in the indigenous population. As a result of the 1967 referendum, the Federal government's power to enact special laws with respect to a particular race was extended to enable the making of laws with respect to Aboriginals. Traditional ownership of land ("native title") was not recognised in law until 1992, when the High Court of Australia held in "Mabo v Queensland (No 2)" that the legal doctrine that Australia had been "terra nullius" ("land belonging to no one") did not apply to Australia at the time of British settlement.The expansion of British control over other areas of the continent began in the early 19th century, initially confined to coastal regions. A settlement was established in Van Diemen's Land (present-day Tasmania) in 1803, and it became a separate colony in 1825. In 1813, Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Wentworth crossed the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, opening the interior to European settlement. The British claim was extended to the whole Australian continent in 1827 when Major Edmund Lockyer established a settlement on King George Sound (modern-day Albany). The Swan River Colony (present-day Perth) was established in 1829, evolving into the largest Australian colony by area, Western Australia. In accordance with population growth, separate colonies were carved from parts of New South Wales: South Australia in 1836, New Zealand in 1841, Victoria in 1851, and Queensland in 1859. The Northern Territory was excised from South Australia in 1911. South Australia was founded as a "free province" — it was never a penal colony. Western Australia was also founded "free" but later accepted transported convicts, the last of which arrived in 1868, decades after transportation had ceased to the other colonies. In the mid-19th century, explorers such as Burke and Wills went further inland to determine its agricultural potential and answer scientific questions.A series of gold rushes beginning in the early 1850s led to an influx of new migrants from China, North America and continental Europe, and also spurred outbreaks of bushranging and civil unrest; the latter peaked in 1854 when Ballarat miners launched the Eureka Rebellion against gold license fees. Between 1855 and 1890, the six colonies individually gained responsible government, managing most of their own affairs while remaining part of the British Empire. The Colonial Office in London retained control of some matters, notably foreign affairs and defence.On 1 January 1901, federation of the colonies was achieved after a decade of planning, consultation and voting. After the 1907 Imperial Conference, Australia and the other self-governing British colonies were given the status of "dominion" within the British Empire. The Federal Capital Territory (later renamed the Australian Capital Territory) was formed in 1911 as the location for the future federal capital of Canberra. Melbourne was the temporary seat of government from 1901 to 1927 while Canberra was being constructed. The Northern Territory was transferred from the control of the South Australian government to the federal parliament in 1911. Australia became the colonial ruler of the Territory of Papua (which had initially been annexed by Queensland in 1883) in 1902 and of the Territory of New Guinea (formerly German New Guinea) in 1920. The two were unified as the Territory of Papua and New Guinea in 1949 and gained independence from Australia in 1975.In 1914, Australia joined Britain in fighting World War I, with support from both the outgoing Commonwealth Liberal Party and the incoming Australian Labor Party. Australians took part in many of the major battles fought on the Western Front. Of about 416,000 who served, about 60,000 were killed and another 152,000 were wounded. Many Australians regard the defeat of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZACs) at Gallipoli as the birth of the nation — its first major military action. The Kokoda Track campaign is regarded by many as an analogous nation-defining event during World War II.Britain's Statute of Westminster 1931 formally ended most of the constitutional links between Australia and the United Kingdom. Australia adopted it in 1942, but it was backdated to 1939 to confirm the validity of legislation passed by the Australian Parliament during World War II. The shock of Britain's defeat in Asia in 1942, followed soon after by the bombing of Darwin and other Japanese attacks, led to a widespread belief in Australia that an invasion was imminent, and a shift towards the United States as a new ally and protector. Since 1951, Australia has been a formal military ally of the United States, under the ANZUS treaty.After World War II, Australia encouraged immigration from mainland Europe. Since the 1970s and following the abolition of the White Australia policy, immigration from Asia and elsewhere was also promoted. As a result, Australia's demography, culture, and self-image were transformed. The "Australia Act 1986" severed the remaining constitutional ties between Australia and the United Kingdom. In a 1999 referendum, 55% of voters and a majority in every state rejected a proposal to become a republic with a president appointed by a two-thirds vote in both Houses of the Australian Parliament. There has been an increasing focus in foreign policy on ties with other Pacific Rim nations while maintaining close ties with Australia's traditional allies and trading partners.Surrounded by the Indian and Pacific oceans, Australia is separated from Asia by the Arafura and Timor seas, with the Coral Sea lying off the Queensland coast, and the Tasman Sea lying between Australia and New Zealand. The world's smallest continent and sixth largest country by total area, Australia—owing to its size and isolation—is often dubbed the "island continent" and is sometimes considered the world's largest island. Australia has of coastline (excluding all offshore islands), and claims an extensive Exclusive Economic Zone of . This exclusive economic zone does not include the Australian Antarctic Territory.Mainland Australia lies between latitudes 9° and 44° South, and longitudes 112° and 154° East. Australia's size gives it a wide variety of landscapes, with tropical rainforests in the north-east, mountain ranges in the south-east, south-west and east, and desert in the centre. The desert or semi-arid land commonly known as the outback makes up by far the largest portion of land. Australia is the driest inhabited continent; its annual rainfall averaged over continental area is less than 500 mm. The population density is 3.2 inhabitants per square kilometre, although a large proportion of the population lives along the temperate south-eastern coastline.The Great Barrier Reef, the world's largest coral reef, lies a short distance off the north-east coast and extends for over . Mount Augustus, claimed to be the world's largest monolith, is located in Western Australia. At , Mount Kosciuszko is the highest mountain on the Australian mainland. Even taller are Mawson Peak (at ), on the remote Australian external territory of Heard Island, and, in the Australian Antarctic Territory, Mount McClintock and Mount Menzies, at and respectively.Eastern Australia is marked by the Great Dividing Range, which runs parallel to the coast of Queensland, New South Wales and much of Victoria. The name is not strictly accurate, because parts of the range consist of low hills, and the highlands are typically no more than in height. The coastal uplands and a belt of Brigalow grasslands lie between the coast and the mountains, while inland of the dividing range are large areas of grassland and shrubland. These include the western plains of New South Wales, and the Mitchell Grass Downs and Mulga Lands of inland Queensland. The northernmost point of the mainland is the tropical Cape York Peninsula.The landscapes of the Top End and the Gulf Country—with their tropical climate—include forest, woodland, wetland, grassland, rainforest and desert. At the north-west corner of the continent are the sandstone cliffs and gorges of The Kimberley, and below that the Pilbara. The Victoria Plains tropical savanna lies south of the Kimberly and Arnhem Land savannas, forming a transition between the coastal savannas and the interior deserts. At the heart of the country are the uplands of central Australia. Prominent features of the centre and south include Uluru (also known as Ayers Rock), the famous sandstone monolith, and the inland Simpson, Tirari and Sturt Stony, Gibson, Great Sandy, Tanami, and Great Victoria deserts, with the famous Nullarbor Plain on the southern coast. The Western Australian mulga shrublands lie between the interior deserts and Mediterranean-climate Southwest Australia.Lying on the Indo-Australian Plate, the mainland of Australia is the lowest and most primordial landmass on Earth with a relatively stable geological history. The landmass includes virtually all known rock types and from all geological time periods spanning over 3.8 billion years of the Earth's history. The Pilbara Craton is one of only two pristine Archaean 3.6–2.7 Ga (billion years ago) crusts identified on the Earth.Having been part of all major supercontinents, the Australian continent began to form after the breakup of Gondwana in the Permian, with the separation of the continental landmass from the African continent and Indian subcontinent. It separated from Antarctica over a prolonged period beginning in the Permian and continuing through to the Cretaceous. When the last glacial period ended in about 10,000 BC, rising sea levels formed Bass Strait, separating Tasmania from the mainland. Then between about 8,000 and 6,500 BC, the lowlands in the north were flooded by the sea, separating New Guinea, the Aru Islands, and the mainland of Australia. The Australian continent is moving toward Eurasia at the rate of 6 to 7 centimetres a year.The Australian mainland's continental crust, excluding the thinned margins, has an average thickness of 38km, with a range in thickness from 24 km to 59 km. Australia's geology can be divided into several main sections, showcasing that the continent grew from west to east: the Archaean cratonic shields found mostly in the west, Proterozoic fold belts in the centre and Phanerozoic sedimentary basins, metamorphic and igneous rocks in the east.The Australian mainland and Tasmania are situated in the middle of the tectonic plate and have no active volcanoes, but due to passing over the East Australia hotspot, recent volcanism has occurred during the Holocene, in the Newer Volcanics Province of western Victoria and southeastern South Australia. Volcanism also occurs in the island of New Guinea (considered geologically as part of the Australian continent), and in the Australian external territory of Heard Island and McDonald Islands. Seismic activity in the Australian mainland and Tasmania is also low, with the greatest number of fatalities having occurred in the 1989 Newcastle earthquake.The climate of Australia is significantly influenced by ocean currents, including the Indian Ocean Dipole and the El Niño–Southern Oscillation, which is correlated with periodic drought, and the seasonal tropical low-pressure system that produces cyclones in northern Australia. These factors cause rainfall to vary markedly from year to year. Much of the northern part of the country has a tropical, predominantly summer-rainfall (monsoon). The south-west corner of the country has a Mediterranean climate. The south-east ranges from oceanic (Tasmania and coastal Victoria) to humid subtropical (upper half of New South Wales), with the highlands featuring alpine and subpolar oceanic climates. The interior is arid to semi-arid.Driven by climate change, average temperatures have risen more than 1°C since 1960. Associated changes in rainfall patterns and climate extremes exacerbate existing issues such as drought and bushfires. 2019 was Australia's warmest recorded year, and the 2019–2020 bushfire season was the country's worst on record. Australia's greenhouse gas emissions per capita are among the highest in the world.Water restrictions are frequently in place in many regions and cities of Australia in response to chronic shortages due to urban population increases and localised drought. Throughout much of the continent, major flooding regularly follows extended periods of drought, flushing out inland river systems, overflowing dams and inundating large inland flood plains, as occurred throughout Eastern Australia in the early 2010s after the 2000s Australian drought.Although most of Australia is semi-arid or desert, the continent includes a diverse range of habitats from alpine heaths to tropical rainforests. Fungi typify that diversity—an estimated 250,000 species—of which only 5% have been described—occur in Australia. Because of the continent's great age, extremely variable weather patterns, and long-term geographic isolation, much of Australia's biota is unique. About 85% of flowering plants, 84% of mammals, more than 45% of birds, and 89% of in-shore, temperate-zone fish are endemic. Australia has at least 755 species of reptile, more than any other country in the world. Besides Antarctica, Australia is the only continent that developed without feline species. Feral cats may have been introduced in the 17th century by Dutch shipwrecks, and later in the 18th century by European settlers. They are now considered a major factor in the decline and extinction of many vulnerable and endangered native species. Australia is also one of 17 megadiverse countries.Australian forests are mostly made up of evergreen species, particularly eucalyptus trees in the less arid regions; wattles replace them as the dominant species in drier regions and deserts. Among well-known Australian animals are the monotremes (the platypus and echidna); a host of marsupials, including the kangaroo, koala, and wombat, and birds such as the emu and the kookaburra. Australia is home to many dangerous animals including some of the most venomous snakes in the world. The dingo was introduced by Austronesian people who traded with Indigenous Australians around 3000 BCE. Many animal and plant species became extinct soon after first human settlement, including the Australian megafauna; others have disappeared since European settlement, among them the thylacine.Many of Australia's ecoregions, and the species within those regions, are threatened by human activities and introduced animal, chromistan, fungal and plant species. All these factors have led to Australia's having the highest mammal extinction rate of any country in the world. The federal "Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999" is the legal framework for the protection of threatened species. Numerous protected areas have been created under the National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia's Biological Diversity to protect and preserve unique ecosystems; 65 wetlands are listed under the Ramsar Convention, and 16 natural World Heritage Sites have been established. Australia was ranked 21st out of 178 countries in the world on the 2018 Environmental Performance Index. There are more than 1,800 animals and plants on Australia's threatened species list, including more than 500 animals.Australia is a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy. The country has maintained a stable liberal democratic political system under its constitution, which is one of the world's oldest, since Federation in 1901. It is also one of the world's oldest federations, in which power is divided between the federal and state and territorial governments. The Australian system of government combines elements derived from the political systems of the United Kingdom (a fused executive, constitutional monarchy and strong party discipline) and the United States (federalism, a written constitution and strong bicameralism with an elected upper house), along with distinctive indigenous features.The federal government is separated into three branches:Elizabeth II reigns as Queen of Australia and is represented in Australia by the governor-general at the federal level and by the governors at the state level, who by convention act on the advice of her ministers. Thus, in practice the governor-general acts as a legal figurehead for the actions of the prime minister and the Federal Executive Council. The governor-general does have extraordinary reserve powers which may be exercised outside the prime minister's request in rare and limited circumstances, the most notable exercise of which was the dismissal of the Whitlam Government in the constitutional crisis of 1975.In the Senate (the upper house), there are 76 senators: twelve each from the states and two each from the mainland territories (the Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory). The House of Representatives (the lower house) has 151 members elected from single-member electoral divisions, commonly known as "electorates" or "seats", allocated to states on the basis of population, with each original state guaranteed a minimum of five seats. Elections for both chambers are normally held every three years simultaneously; senators have overlapping six-year terms except for those from the territories, whose terms are not fixed but are tied to the electoral cycle for the lower house; thus only 40 of the 76 places in the Senate are put to each election unless the cycle is interrupted by a double dissolution.Australia's electoral system uses preferential voting for all lower house elections with the exception of Tasmania and the ACT which, along with the Senate and most state upper houses, combine it with proportional representation in a system known as the single transferable vote. Voting is compulsory for all enrolled citizens 18 years and over in every jurisdiction, as is enrolment. The party with majority support in the House of Representatives forms the government and its leader becomes Prime Minister. In cases where no party has majority support, the Governor-General has the constitutional power to appoint the Prime Minister and, if necessary, dismiss one that has lost the confidence of Parliament. Due to the relatively unique position of Australia operating as a Westminster Parliamentary democracy with an elected upper house, the system has sometimes been referred to as having a "Washminster mutation", or as a Semi-parliamentary system. There are two major political groups that usually form government, federally and in the states: the Australian Labor Party and the Coalition which is a formal grouping of the Liberal Party and its minor partner, the National Party. Within Australian political culture, the Coalition is considered centre-right and the Labor Party is considered centre-left. Independent members and several minor parties have achieved representation in Australian parliaments, mostly in upper houses. The Australian Greens are often considered the "third force" in politics, being the third largest party by both vote and membership.The most recent federal election was held on 18 May 2019 and resulted in the Coalition, led by Prime Minister Scott Morrison, retaining government.Australia has six states — New South Wales (NSW), Queensland (QLD), South Australia (SA), Tasmania (TAS), Victoria (VIC) and Western Australia (WA) — and two major mainland territories—the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and the Northern Territory (NT). In most respects, these two territories function as states, except that the Commonwealth Parliament has the power to modify or repeal any legislation passed by the territory parliaments.Under the constitution, the states essentially have plenary legislative power to legislate on any subject, whereas the Commonwealth (federal) Parliament may legislate only within the subject areas enumerated under section 51. For example, state parliaments have the power to legislate with respect to education, criminal law and state police, health, transport, and local government, but the Commonwealth Parliament does not have any specific power to legislate in these areas. However, Commonwealth laws prevail over state laws to the extent of the inconsistency.Each state and major mainland territory has its own parliament — unicameral in the Northern Territory, the ACT and Queensland, and bicameral in the other states. The states are sovereign entities, although subject to certain powers of the Commonwealth as defined by the Constitution. The lower houses are known as the Legislative Assembly (the House of Assembly in South Australia and Tasmania); the upper houses are known as the Legislative Council. The head of the government in each state is the Premier and in each territory the Chief Minister. The Queen is represented in each state by a governor; and in the Northern Territory, the administrator. In the Commonwealth, the Queen's representative is the governor-general.The Commonwealth Parliament also directly administers the external territories of Ashmore and Cartier Islands, Christmas Island, the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, the Coral Sea Islands, Heard Island and McDonald Islands, and the claimed region of Australian Antarctic Territory, as well as the internal Jervis Bay Territory, a naval base and sea port for the national capital in land that was formerly part of New South Wales. The external territory of Norfolk Island previously exercised considerable autonomy under the "Norfolk Island Act 1979" through its own legislative assembly and an Administrator to represent the Queen. In 2015, the Commonwealth Parliament abolished self-government, integrating Norfolk Island into the Australian tax and welfare systems and replacing its legislative assembly with a council. Macquarie Island is part of Tasmania, and Lord Howe Island of New South Wales.Over recent decades, Australia's foreign relations have been driven by a close association with the United States through the ANZUS pact, and by a desire to develop relationships with Asia and the Pacific, particularly through Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Pacific Islands Forum and the Pacific Community, of which Australia is a founding member. In 2005, Australia secured an inaugural seat at the East Asia Summit following its accession to the Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia, and in 2011 attended the Sixth East Asia Summit in Indonesia. Australia is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, in which the Commonwealth Heads of Government meetings provide the main forum for co-operation. Australia has pursued the cause of international trade liberalisation. It led the formation of the Cairns Group and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation.Australia is a member of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Trade Organization (WTO), and has pursued several major bilateral free trade agreements, most recently the Australia–United States Free Trade Agreement and Closer Economic Relations with New Zealand, with another free trade agreement being negotiated with China — the Australia–China Free Trade Agreement — and Japan, South Korea in 2011, Australia–Chile Free Trade Agreement, and has put the Trans-Pacific Partnership before parliament for ratification.Australia maintains a deeply integrated relationship with neighbouring New Zealand, with free mobility of citizens between the two countries under the Trans-Tasman Travel Arrangement and free trade under the Australia–New Zealand Closer Economic Relations Trade Agreement. New Zealand, Canada and the United Kingdom are the most favourably viewed countries in the world by Australian people.Along with New Zealand, the United Kingdom, Malaysia and Singapore, Australia is party to the Five Power Defence Arrangements, a regional defence agreement. A founding member country of the United Nations, Australia is strongly committed to multilateralism and maintains an international aid program under which some 60 countries receive assistance. The 2005–2006 budget provides AU$2.5 billion for development assistance. Australia ranks fifteenth overall in the Center for Global Development's 2012 Commitment to Development Index.Australia's armed forces—the Australian Defence Force (ADF) — comprise the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), the Australian Army and the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), in total numbering 81,214 personnel (including 57,982 regulars and 23,232 reservists) . The titular role of Commander-in-Chief is vested in the Governor-General, who appoints a Chief of the Defence Force from one of the armed services on the advice of the government. In a diarchy, the CDF serves as co-chairman of the Defence Committee, conjointly with the Secretary of Defence, in the command and control of the Australian Defence Organisation.In the 2016–2017 budget, defence spending comprised 2% of GDP, representing the world's 12th largest defence budget. Australia has been involved in United Nations and regional peacekeeping, disaster relief and armed conflict, including the 2003 invasion of Iraq; Australia currently has deployed about 2,241 personnel in varying capacities to 12 international operations in areas including Iraq and Afghanistan.A wealthy country, Australia has a market economy, a high GDP per capita, and a relatively low rate of poverty. In terms of average wealth, Australia ranked second in the world after Switzerland from 2013 until 2018. In 2018, Australia overtook Switzerland and became the country with the highest average wealth. Australia's relative poverty rate is 13.6%. It was identified by the Credit Suisse Research Institute as the nation with the highest median wealth in the world and the second-highest average wealth per adult in 2013.The Australian dollar is the currency for the nation, including Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and Norfolk Island, as well as the independent Pacific Island states of Kiribati, Nauru, and Tuvalu. With the 2006 merger of the Australian Stock Exchange and the Sydney Futures Exchange, the Australian Securities Exchange became the ninth largest in the world.Ranked fifth in the Index of Economic Freedom (2017), Australia is the world's 13th largest economy and has the tenth highest per capita GDP (nominal) at US$55,692. The country was ranked third in the United Nations 2017 Human Development Index. Melbourne reached top spot for the fourth year in a row on "The Economist"s 2014 list of the world's most liveable cities, followed by Adelaide, Sydney, and Perth in the fifth, seventh, and ninth places respectively. Total government debt in Australia is about A$190 billion—20% of GDP in 2010. Australia has among the highest house prices and some of the highest household debt levels in the world.An emphasis on exporting commodities rather than manufactured goods has underpinned a significant increase in Australia's terms of trade since the start of the 21st century, due to rising commodity prices. Australia has a balance of payments that is more than 7% of GDP negative, and has had persistently large current account deficits for more than 50 years. Australia has grown at an average annual rate of 3.6% for over 15 years, in comparison to the OECD annual average of 2.5%.Australia was the only advanced economy not to experience a recession due to the global financial downturn in 2008–2009. However, the economies of six of Australia's major trading partners were in recession, which in turn affected Australia, significantly hampering its economic growth. From 2012 to early 2013, Australia's national economy grew, but some non-mining states and Australia's non-mining economy experienced a recession.The Hawke Government floated the Australian dollar in 1983 and partially deregulated the financial system. The Howard Government followed with a partial deregulation of the labour market and the further privatisation of state-owned businesses, most notably in the telecommunications industry. The indirect tax system was substantially changed in July 2000 with the introduction of a 10% Goods and Services Tax (GST). In Australia's tax system, personal and company income tax are the main sources of government revenue., there were 12,640,800 people employed (either full- or part-time), with an unemployment rate of 5.2%. Data released in mid-November 2013 showed that the number of welfare recipients had grown by 55%. In 2007 228,621 Newstart unemployment allowance recipients were registered, a total that increased to 646,414 in March 2013. According to the Graduate Careers Survey, full-time employment for newly qualified professionals from various occupations has declined since 2011 but it increases for graduates three years after graduation.Access to biocapacity in Australia is much higher than world average. In 2016, Australia had 12.3 global hectares of biocapacity per person within its territory, much more than the world average of 1.6 global hectares per person. In 2016 Australia used 6.6 global hectares of biocapacity per person – their ecological footprint of consumption. This means they use half as much biocapacity as Australia contains. As a result, Australia is running a biocapacity reserve.In 2020 the Australian Council of Social Service released a report stating that relative poverty was growing in Australia, with an estimated 3.2 million people, or 13.6% of the population, living below an internationally accepted relative poverty threshold of 50% of a country's median income. It also estimated that there were 774,000 (17.7%) children under the age of 15 in relative poverty.Australia has an average population density of / 7682300 round 1 persons per square kilometre of total land area, which makes it one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world. The population is heavily concentrated on the east coast, and in particular in the south-eastern region between South East Queensland to the north-east and Adelaide to the south-west.Australia is highly urbanised, with 67% of the population living in the Greater Capital City Statistical Areas (metropolitan areas of the state and mainland territorial capital cities) in 2018. Metropolitan areas with more than one million inhabitants are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide.In common with many other developed countries, Australia is experiencing a demographic shift towards an older population, with more retirees and fewer people of working age. In 2018 the average age of the Australian population was 38.8 years. In 2015, 2.15% of the Australian population lived overseas, one of the worldwide.Between 1788 and the Second World War, the vast majority of settlers and immigrants came from the British Isles (principally England, Ireland and Scotland), although there was significant immigration from China and Germany during the 19th century. In the decades immediately following the Second World War, Australia received a large wave of immigration from across Europe, with many more immigrants arriving from Southern and Eastern Europe than in previous decades. Since the end of the White Australia policy in 1973, Australia has pursued an official policy of multiculturalism, and there has been a large and continuing wave of immigration from across the world, with Asia being the largest source of immigrants in the 21st century.Today, Australia has the world's eighth-largest immigrant population, with immigrants accounting for 30% of the population, the highest proportion among major Western nations. 160,323 permanent immigrants were admitted to Australia in 2018–2019 (excluding refugees), whilst there was a net population gain of 239,600 people from all permanent and temporary immigration in that year. The majority of immigrants are skilled, but the immigration program includes categories for family members and refugees. In 2020, the largest foreign-born populations were those born in England (3.8%), India (2.8%), Mainland China (2.5%), New Zealand (2.2%), the Philippines (1.2%) and Vietnam (1.1%).In the 2016 Australian census, the most commonly nominated ancestries were: At the 2016 census, 649,171 people (2.8% of the total population) identified as being Indigenous — Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders. Indigenous Australians experience higher than average rates of imprisonment and unemployment, lower levels of education, and life expectancies for males and females that are, respectively, 11 and 17 years lower than those of non-indigenous Australians. Some remote Indigenous communities have been described as having "failed state"-like conditions.Although Australia has no official language, English is the "de facto" national language. Australian English is a major variety of the language with a distinctive accent and lexicon, and differs slightly from other varieties of English in grammar and spelling. General Australian serves as the standard dialect.According to the 2016 census, English is the only language spoken in the home for 72.7% of the population. The next most common languages spoken at home are Mandarin (2.5%), Arabic (1.4%), Cantonese (1.2%), Vietnamese (1.2%) and Italian (1.2%). Over 250 Indigenous Australian languages are thought to have existed at the time of first European contact, of which fewer than twenty are still in daily use by all age groups. About 110 others are spoken exclusively by older people. At the time of the 2006 census, 52,000 Indigenous Australians, representing 12% of the Indigenous population, reported that they spoke an Indigenous language at home. Australia has a sign language known as Auslan, which is the main language of about 10,112 deaf people who reported that they spoke Auslan language at home in the 2016 census.Australia has no state religion; Section 116 of the Australian Constitution prohibits the federal government from making any law to establish any religion, impose any religious observance, or prohibit the free exercise of any religion. In the 2016 census, 52.1% of Australians were counted as Christian, including 22.6% as Catholic and 13.3% as Anglican; 30.1% of the population reported having "no religion"; 8.2% identify with non-Christian religions, the largest of these being Islam (2.6%), followed by Buddhism (2.4%), Hinduism (1.9%), Sikhism (0.5%) and Judaism (0.4%). The remaining 9.7% of the population did not provide an adequate answer. Those who reported having no religion increased conspicuously from 19% in 2006 to 22% in 2011 to 30.1% in 2016.Before European settlement, the animist beliefs of Australia's indigenous people had been practised for many thousands of years. Mainland Aboriginal Australians' spirituality is known as the Dreaming and it places a heavy emphasis on belonging to the land. The collection of stories that it contains shaped Aboriginal law and customs. Aboriginal art, story and dance continue to draw on these spiritual traditions. The spirituality and customs of Torres Strait Islanders, who inhabit the islands between Australia and New Guinea, reflected their Melanesian origins and dependence on the sea. The 1996 Australian census counted more than 7000 respondents as followers of a traditional Aboriginal religion.Since the arrival of the First Fleet of British ships in 1788, Christianity has become the major religion practised in Australia. Christian churches have played an integral role in the development of education, health and welfare services in Australia. For much of Australian history, the Church of England (now known as the Anglican Church of Australia) was the largest religious denomination, with a large Roman Catholic minority. However, multicultural immigration has contributed to a steep decline in its relative position since the Second World War. Similarly, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sikhism and Judaism have all grown in Australia over the past half-century.Australia has one of the lowest levels of religious adherence in the world. In 2018, 13% of women and 10% of men reported attending church at least weekly.Australia's life expectancy is the fourth highest in the world for males and the third highest for females. Life expectancy in Australia in 2014–2016 was 80.4 years for males and 84.6 years for females. Australia has the highest rates of skin cancer in the world, while cigarette smoking is the largest preventable cause of death and disease, responsible for 7.8% of the total mortality and disease. Ranked second in preventable causes is hypertension at 7.6%, with obesity third at 7.5%. Australia ranks 35th in the world and near the top of developed nations for its proportion of obese adults and nearly two thirds (63%) of its adult population is either overweight or obese.Total expenditure on health (including private sector spending) is around 9.8% of GDP. Australia introduced universal health care in 1975. Known as Medicare, it is now nominally funded by an income tax surcharge known as the Medicare levy, currently at 2%. The states manage hospitals and attached outpatient services, while the Commonwealth funds the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (subsidising the costs of medicines) and general practice.School attendance, or registration for home schooling, is compulsory throughout Australia. Education is the responsibility of the individual states and territories so the rules vary between states, but in general children are required to attend school from the age of about 5 until about 16. In some states (e.g., Western Australia, the Northern Territory and New South Wales), children aged 16–17 are required to either attend school or participate in vocational training, such as an apprenticeship.Australia has an adult literacy rate that was estimated to be 99% in 2003. However, a 2011–2012 report for the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that Tasmania has a literacy and numeracy rate of only 50%.Australia has 37 government-funded universities and three private universities, as well as a number of other specialist institutions that provide approved courses at the higher education level. The OECD places Australia among the most expensive nations to attend university. There is a state-based system of vocational training, known as TAFE, and many trades conduct apprenticeships for training new tradespeople. About 58% of Australians aged from 25 to 64 have vocational or tertiary qualifications, and the tertiary graduation rate of 49% is the highest among OECD countries. 30.9% of Australia's population has attained a higher education qualification, which is among the highest percentages in the world.Australia has the highest ratio of international students per head of population in the world by a large margin, with 812,000 international students enrolled in the nation's universities and vocational institutions in 2019. Accordingly, in 2019, international students represented on average 26.7% of the student bodies of Australian universities. International education therefore represents one of the country's largest exports and has a pronounced influence on the country's demographics, with a significant proportion of international students remaining in Australia after graduation on various skill and employment visas.In 2003, Australia's energy sources were coal (58.4%), hydropower (19.1%), natural gas (13.5%), liquid/gas fossil fuel-switching plants (5.4%), oil (2.9%), and other renewable resources like wind power, solar energy, and bioenergy (0.7%). During the 21st century, Australia has been trending to generate more energy using renewable resources and less energy using fossil fuels. In 2020, Australia used coal for 62% of all energy (3.6% increase compared to 2013), wind power for 9.9% (9.5% increase), natural gas for 9.9% (3.6% decrease), solar power for 9.9% (9.8% increase), hydropower for 6.4% (12.7% decrease), bioenergy for 1.4% (1.2% increase), and other sources like oil and waste coal mine gas for 0.5%.In August 2009, Australia's government set a goal to achieve 20% of all energy in the country from renewable sources by 2020. They achieved this goal, as renewable resources accounted for 27.7% of Australia's energy in 2020.Since 1788, the primary influence behind Australian culture has been Anglo-Celtic Western culture, with some Indigenous influences. The divergence and evolution that has occurred in the ensuing centuries has resulted in a distinctive Australian culture. The culture of the United States has served as a significant influence, particularly through television and cinema. Other cultural influences come from neighbouring Asian countries, and through large-scale immigration from non-English-speaking nations.Australia has over 100,000 Aboriginal rock art sites, and traditional designs, patterns and stories infuse contemporary Indigenous Australian art, "the last great art movement of the 20th century" according to critic Robert Hughes; its exponents include Emily Kame Kngwarreye. Early colonial artists showed a fascination with the unfamiliar land. The impressionistic works of Arthur Streeton, Tom Roberts and other members of the 19th-century Heidelberg School—the first "distinctively Australian" movement in Western art—gave expression to nationalist sentiments in the lead-up to Federation. While the school remained influential into the 1900s, modernists such as Margaret Preston, and, later, Sidney Nolan and Arthur Boyd, explored new artistic trends. The landscape remained a central subject matter for Fred Williams, Brett Whiteley and other post-war artists whose works, eclectic in style yet uniquely Australian, moved between the figurative and the abstract. The national and state galleries maintain collections of local and international art. Australia has one of the world's highest attendances of art galleries and museums per head of population.Australian literature grew slowly in the decades following European settlement though Indigenous oral traditions, many of which have since been recorded in writing, are much older. In the 1870s, Adam Lindsay Gordon posthumously became the first Australian poet to attain a wide readership. Following in his footsteps, Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson captured the experience of the bush using a distinctive Australian vocabulary. Their works are still popular; Paterson's bush poem "Waltzing Matilda" (1895) is regarded as Australia's unofficial national anthem. Miles Franklin is the namesake of Australia's most prestigious literary prize, awarded annually to the best novel about Australian life. Its first recipient, Patrick White, went on to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1973. Australian Booker Prize winners include Peter Carey, Thomas Keneally and Richard Flanagan. Authors David Malouf, Germaine Greer, Helen Garner, playwright David Williamson and poet Les Murray are also renowned.Many of Australia's performing arts companies receive funding through the federal government's Australia Council. There is a symphony orchestra in each state, and a national opera company, Opera Australia, well known for its famous soprano Joan Sutherland. At the beginning of the 20th century, Nellie Melba was one of the world's leading opera singers. Ballet and dance are represented by The Australian Ballet and various state companies. Each state has a publicly funded theatre company."The Story of the Kelly Gang" (1906), the world's first feature-length narrative film, spurred a boom in Australian cinema during the silent film era. After World War I, Hollywood monopolised the industry, and by the 1960s Australian film production had effectively ceased. With the benefit of government support, the Australian New Wave of the 1970s brought provocative and successful films, many exploring themes of national identity, such as "Wake in Fright" and "Gallipoli", while "Crocodile Dundee" and the Ozploitation movement's "Mad Max" series became international blockbusters. In a film market flooded with foreign content, Australian films delivered a 7.7% share of the local box office in 2015. The AACTAs are Australia's premier film and television awards, and notable Academy Award winners from Australia include Geoffrey Rush, Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett and Heath Ledger.Australia has two public broadcasters (the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the multicultural Special Broadcasting Service), three commercial television networks, several pay-TV services, and numerous public, non-profit television and radio stations. Each major city has at least one daily newspaper, and there are two national daily newspapers, "The Australian" and "The Australian Financial Review". In 2010, Reporters Without Borders placed Australia 18th on a list of 178 countries ranked by press freedom, behind New Zealand (8th) but ahead of the United Kingdom (19th) and United States (20th). This relatively low ranking is primarily because of the limited diversity of commercial media ownership in Australia; most print media are under the control of News Corporation and, after Fairfax Media was merged with Nine, Nine Entertainment Co.Most Indigenous Australian groups subsisted on a simple hunter-gatherer diet of native fauna and flora, otherwise called bush tucker. The first settlers introduced British food to the continent, much of which is now considered typical Australian food, such as the Sunday roast. Multicultural immigration transformed Australian cuisine; post-World War II European migrants, particularly from the Mediterranean, helped to build a thriving Australian coffee culture, and the influence of Asian cultures has led to Australian variants of their staple foods, such as the Chinese-inspired dim sim and Chiko Roll. Vegemite, pavlova, lamingtons and meat pies are regarded as iconic Australian foods.Australian wine is produced mainly in the southern, cooler parts of the country. Australia is also known for its cafe and coffee culture in urban centres, which has influenced coffee culture abroad, including New York City. Australia was responsible for the flat white coffee–purported to have originated in a Sydney cafe in the mid-1980s.Cricket and football are the predominate sports in Australia during the summer and winter months, respectively. Australia is unique in that it has professional leagues for four football codes. Originating in Melbourne in the 1850s, Australian rules football is the most popular code in all states except New South Wales and Queensland, where rugby league holds sway, followed by rugby union; the imaginary border separating areas where Australian rules football dominates from those were the two rugby codes prevail is known as the Barassi Line. Soccer, while ranked fourth in popularity and resources, has the highest overall participation rates. Cricket is popular across all borders and has been regarded by many Australians as the national sport. The Australian national cricket team competed against England in the first Test match (1877) and the first One Day International (1971), and against New Zealand in the first Twenty20 International (2004), winning all three games. It has also participated in every edition of the Cricket World Cup, winning the tournament a record five times.Australia is also notable for water-based sports, such as swimming and surfing. The surf lifesaving movement originated in Australia, and the volunteer lifesaver is one of the country's icons. Nationally, other popular sports include horse racing, basketball, and motor racing. The annual Melbourne Cup horse race and the Sydney to Hobart yacht race attract intense interest. In 2016, the Australian Sports Commission revealed that swimming, cycling and soccer are the three most popular participation sports.Australia is one of five nations to have participated in every Summer Olympics of the modern era, and has hosted the Games twice: 1956 in Melbourne and 2000 in Sydney. Australia has also participated in every Commonwealth Games, hosting the event in 1938, 1962, 1982, 2006 and 2018. Australia made its inaugural appearance at the Pacific Games in 2015. As well as being a regular FIFA World Cup participant, Australia has won the OFC Nations Cup four times and the AFC Asian Cup once—the only country to have won championships in two different FIFA confederations. In June 2020, Australia won its bid to co-host the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup with New Zealand. The country regularly competes among the world elite basketball teams as it is among the global top three teams in terms of qualifications to the Basketball Tournament at the Summer Olympics. Other major international events held in Australia include the Australian Open tennis grand slam tournament, international cricket matches, and the Australian Formula One Grand Prix. The highest-rating television programs include sports telecasts such as the Summer Olympics, FIFA World Cup, The Ashes, Rugby League State of Origin, and the grand finals of the National Rugby League and Australian Football League. Skiing in Australia began in the 1860s and snow sports take place in the Australian Alps and parts of Tasmania.
|
[
"Billy Hughes",
"Gough Whitlam",
"Malcolm Fraser",
"Joseph Cook",
"George Reid",
"John McEwen",
"Scott Morrison",
"Arthur Fadden",
"Malcolm Turnbull",
"Robert Menzies",
"Andrew Fisher",
"Harold Holt",
"Earle Page",
"John Howard",
"Edmund Barton",
"Frank Forde",
"Kevin Rudd",
"Tony Abbott",
"Ben Chifley",
"William McMahon",
"Paul Keating",
"Julia Gillard",
"Chris Watson",
"Anthony Albanese",
"Stanley Bruce",
"John Gorton",
"James Scullin",
"Bob Hawke",
"Alfred Deakin",
"John Curtin"
] |
|
Which position did William Unwin Heygate hold in May, 1865?
|
May 02, 1865
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q16931294_P39_0
|
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1874 to Mar, 1880.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1868 to Nov, 1868.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Feb, 1861 to Jul, 1865.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1870 to Jan, 1874.
|
William Unwin HeygateWilliam Unwin Heygate (12 March 1825 - 2 March 1902) was a British Conservative Member of Parliament and Leicestershire politician.Heygate was born on 12 March 1825, the second son of Sir William Heygate, 1st Baronet (1782-1844), Member of Parliament and Lord Mayor of London. He was educated at Eton College and Merton College, Oxford, where he was awarded a B. A. in 1847 and an M. A. in 1850. He became a pupil at Lincoln's Inn on 6 November 1846 and was called to the bar on 19 November 1850.After unsuccessfully contesting Bridport in 1857, Heygate entered the Parliament for the Conservative Party from Leicester in 1861, but was defeated in the 1865 General election. He returned briefly as a member from Stamford in a by-election in 1868 (the constituency was abolished later the same year), and was again elected for South Leicestershire in 1870, serving until he stepped down in 1880.Heygate was a prominent politician in Leicestershire. He was an Alderman of Leicestershire County Council, a Justice of the peace and a Deputy Lieutenant of the county. In business, he was Chairman of Pare′s Leicestershire Banking Company, a director of the Midland Railway, and of the Canada Company.Heygate died at the Hotel Burlington, in Dover, 2 March 1902.Heygate married, Constance Mary Beaumont, daughter of Sir George Beaumont, on 6 July 1852. The couple had four children:
|
[
"Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did William Unwin Heygate hold in 1865-05-02?
|
May 02, 1865
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q16931294_P39_0
|
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1874 to Mar, 1880.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1868 to Nov, 1868.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Feb, 1861 to Jul, 1865.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1870 to Jan, 1874.
|
William Unwin HeygateWilliam Unwin Heygate (12 March 1825 - 2 March 1902) was a British Conservative Member of Parliament and Leicestershire politician.Heygate was born on 12 March 1825, the second son of Sir William Heygate, 1st Baronet (1782-1844), Member of Parliament and Lord Mayor of London. He was educated at Eton College and Merton College, Oxford, where he was awarded a B. A. in 1847 and an M. A. in 1850. He became a pupil at Lincoln's Inn on 6 November 1846 and was called to the bar on 19 November 1850.After unsuccessfully contesting Bridport in 1857, Heygate entered the Parliament for the Conservative Party from Leicester in 1861, but was defeated in the 1865 General election. He returned briefly as a member from Stamford in a by-election in 1868 (the constituency was abolished later the same year), and was again elected for South Leicestershire in 1870, serving until he stepped down in 1880.Heygate was a prominent politician in Leicestershire. He was an Alderman of Leicestershire County Council, a Justice of the peace and a Deputy Lieutenant of the county. In business, he was Chairman of Pare′s Leicestershire Banking Company, a director of the Midland Railway, and of the Canada Company.Heygate died at the Hotel Burlington, in Dover, 2 March 1902.Heygate married, Constance Mary Beaumont, daughter of Sir George Beaumont, on 6 July 1852. The couple had four children:
|
[
"Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did William Unwin Heygate hold in 02/05/1865?
|
May 02, 1865
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q16931294_P39_0
|
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1874 to Mar, 1880.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1868 to Nov, 1868.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Feb, 1861 to Jul, 1865.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1870 to Jan, 1874.
|
William Unwin HeygateWilliam Unwin Heygate (12 March 1825 - 2 March 1902) was a British Conservative Member of Parliament and Leicestershire politician.Heygate was born on 12 March 1825, the second son of Sir William Heygate, 1st Baronet (1782-1844), Member of Parliament and Lord Mayor of London. He was educated at Eton College and Merton College, Oxford, where he was awarded a B. A. in 1847 and an M. A. in 1850. He became a pupil at Lincoln's Inn on 6 November 1846 and was called to the bar on 19 November 1850.After unsuccessfully contesting Bridport in 1857, Heygate entered the Parliament for the Conservative Party from Leicester in 1861, but was defeated in the 1865 General election. He returned briefly as a member from Stamford in a by-election in 1868 (the constituency was abolished later the same year), and was again elected for South Leicestershire in 1870, serving until he stepped down in 1880.Heygate was a prominent politician in Leicestershire. He was an Alderman of Leicestershire County Council, a Justice of the peace and a Deputy Lieutenant of the county. In business, he was Chairman of Pare′s Leicestershire Banking Company, a director of the Midland Railway, and of the Canada Company.Heygate died at the Hotel Burlington, in Dover, 2 March 1902.Heygate married, Constance Mary Beaumont, daughter of Sir George Beaumont, on 6 July 1852. The couple had four children:
|
[
"Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did William Unwin Heygate hold in May 02, 1865?
|
May 02, 1865
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q16931294_P39_0
|
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1874 to Mar, 1880.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1868 to Nov, 1868.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Feb, 1861 to Jul, 1865.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1870 to Jan, 1874.
|
William Unwin HeygateWilliam Unwin Heygate (12 March 1825 - 2 March 1902) was a British Conservative Member of Parliament and Leicestershire politician.Heygate was born on 12 March 1825, the second son of Sir William Heygate, 1st Baronet (1782-1844), Member of Parliament and Lord Mayor of London. He was educated at Eton College and Merton College, Oxford, where he was awarded a B. A. in 1847 and an M. A. in 1850. He became a pupil at Lincoln's Inn on 6 November 1846 and was called to the bar on 19 November 1850.After unsuccessfully contesting Bridport in 1857, Heygate entered the Parliament for the Conservative Party from Leicester in 1861, but was defeated in the 1865 General election. He returned briefly as a member from Stamford in a by-election in 1868 (the constituency was abolished later the same year), and was again elected for South Leicestershire in 1870, serving until he stepped down in 1880.Heygate was a prominent politician in Leicestershire. He was an Alderman of Leicestershire County Council, a Justice of the peace and a Deputy Lieutenant of the county. In business, he was Chairman of Pare′s Leicestershire Banking Company, a director of the Midland Railway, and of the Canada Company.Heygate died at the Hotel Burlington, in Dover, 2 March 1902.Heygate married, Constance Mary Beaumont, daughter of Sir George Beaumont, on 6 July 1852. The couple had four children:
|
[
"Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did William Unwin Heygate hold in 05/02/1865?
|
May 02, 1865
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q16931294_P39_0
|
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1874 to Mar, 1880.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1868 to Nov, 1868.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Feb, 1861 to Jul, 1865.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1870 to Jan, 1874.
|
William Unwin HeygateWilliam Unwin Heygate (12 March 1825 - 2 March 1902) was a British Conservative Member of Parliament and Leicestershire politician.Heygate was born on 12 March 1825, the second son of Sir William Heygate, 1st Baronet (1782-1844), Member of Parliament and Lord Mayor of London. He was educated at Eton College and Merton College, Oxford, where he was awarded a B. A. in 1847 and an M. A. in 1850. He became a pupil at Lincoln's Inn on 6 November 1846 and was called to the bar on 19 November 1850.After unsuccessfully contesting Bridport in 1857, Heygate entered the Parliament for the Conservative Party from Leicester in 1861, but was defeated in the 1865 General election. He returned briefly as a member from Stamford in a by-election in 1868 (the constituency was abolished later the same year), and was again elected for South Leicestershire in 1870, serving until he stepped down in 1880.Heygate was a prominent politician in Leicestershire. He was an Alderman of Leicestershire County Council, a Justice of the peace and a Deputy Lieutenant of the county. In business, he was Chairman of Pare′s Leicestershire Banking Company, a director of the Midland Railway, and of the Canada Company.Heygate died at the Hotel Burlington, in Dover, 2 March 1902.Heygate married, Constance Mary Beaumont, daughter of Sir George Beaumont, on 6 July 1852. The couple had four children:
|
[
"Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did William Unwin Heygate hold in 02-May-186502-May-1865?
|
May 02, 1865
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q16931294_P39_0
|
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1874 to Mar, 1880.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1868 to Nov, 1868.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 18th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Feb, 1861 to Jul, 1865.
William Unwin Heygate holds the position of Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jun, 1870 to Jan, 1874.
|
William Unwin HeygateWilliam Unwin Heygate (12 March 1825 - 2 March 1902) was a British Conservative Member of Parliament and Leicestershire politician.Heygate was born on 12 March 1825, the second son of Sir William Heygate, 1st Baronet (1782-1844), Member of Parliament and Lord Mayor of London. He was educated at Eton College and Merton College, Oxford, where he was awarded a B. A. in 1847 and an M. A. in 1850. He became a pupil at Lincoln's Inn on 6 November 1846 and was called to the bar on 19 November 1850.After unsuccessfully contesting Bridport in 1857, Heygate entered the Parliament for the Conservative Party from Leicester in 1861, but was defeated in the 1865 General election. He returned briefly as a member from Stamford in a by-election in 1868 (the constituency was abolished later the same year), and was again elected for South Leicestershire in 1870, serving until he stepped down in 1880.Heygate was a prominent politician in Leicestershire. He was an Alderman of Leicestershire County Council, a Justice of the peace and a Deputy Lieutenant of the county. In business, he was Chairman of Pare′s Leicestershire Banking Company, a director of the Midland Railway, and of the Canada Company.Heygate died at the Hotel Burlington, in Dover, 2 March 1902.Heygate married, Constance Mary Beaumont, daughter of Sir George Beaumont, on 6 July 1852. The couple had four children:
|
[
"Member of the 19th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 20th Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 21st Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Cecil L'Estrange Malone hold in Feb, 1928?
|
February 03, 1928
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q5056185_P39_1
|
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Aug, 1920 to Oct, 1922.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom from May, 1929 to Oct, 1931.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1928 to May, 1929.
|
Cecil MaloneCecil John L'Estrange Malone (7 September 1890 – 25 February 1965) was a British politician and pioneer naval aviator who served as the United Kingdom's first Communist member of parliament.Malone was born in Dalton Holme, a parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, on 7 September 1890. He was the son of the Reverend Savile L'Estrange Malone and Frances Mary Faljomb. He was related to the sisters Constance Markievicz and Eva Gore-Booth.Malone was educated at Cordwalles School in Maidenhead before joining the Royal Navy in 1905 and went through officer training at Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. On 15 March 1910, he was confirmed as a sub-lieutenant having previously been acting in that rank. In 1911, he was part of the second course approved by the Admiralty to attend Naval Flying School, Eastchurch. He was promoted to lieutenant from sub-lieutenant on 15 December 1911.Malone earned his Royal Aero Club certificate (No. 195) on 12 March 1912. In the Army Manoeuvres of 1912, Malone flew a twin-engined triple-screwed Short biplane. He is also noted for flying off the forecastle of steaming .During World War I, Malone commanded Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) planes in the Cuxhaven Raid on 25 December 1914. From August 1914 to March 1915, he captained , a cross-channel steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. From March 1915 to April 1916, he captained , another steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. Under Malone's command, seaplanes from "Ben-my-Chree" were the first on record to carry torpedoes and they torpedoed three enemy vessels in 1916. Malone then took over command of the East Indies and Egypt Seaplane Squadron, for which he was awarded the Fourth Class of the Order of the Nile.Malone was appointed to the Plans Division of the Admiralty in 1918 before becoming the First British Air Attache at the Embassy of the United Kingdom, Paris. In this capacity, he was the Air Representative of the Supreme War Council in Versailles in 1918. He was awarded Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his war efforts.Malone was elected as the Coalition Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) for East Leyton at the 1918 general election. He was a member of the anti-communist Reconstruction Society and wrote a number of articles strongly criticising left-wing activists. As Adams and Wilson wrote, "his early career contained no hint of his subsequent espousal of the communist cause."On 13 September 1919, with a passport endorsed by the British Foreign Office in hand, Cecil Malone embarked on the "S.S. Arcturus" for Helsinki. There Malone, who intended to visit Soviet Russia despite the blockade of the country, unexpectedly met up with another individual planning on crossing over to Petrograd. After travelling by sea and land to the border, the pair managed to cross the frontier through deserted forests and marshland by foot, arriving at the Soviet border on Sunday, 28 September. The two arrived in Petrograd by train at 6 pm the following day. Malone met and spoke with key leaders of the trade union movement in Petrograd before proceeding by train to Moscow.In Moscow, Malone met with Maxim Litvinov, then a top official in the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, with whom he had a long discussion. He later met for an hour with foreign minister Georgii Chicherin. Malone's new friends arranged for him to accompany Red Army leader Leon Trotsky on an inspection of troops at Tula aboard Trotsky's special train. Accompanying Malone on the trip were the head of the Supreme Council of National Economy (VSNKh), Alexei Rykov; chief of food supply for the Russian Republic, Alexander Tsiurupa; and People's Commissar of Education Anatoly Lunacharsky.During his visit, detailed in his memoir, Malone toured factories and theatres, power stations and government offices. He found the mission of the Bolshevik government in attempting economic reconstruction to be compelling and emerged from his trip a committed communist. "The history of Allied negotiations and transactions with Russia appears to have been a chain of catastrophes and mistakes" he wrote:"...[I]t seems there was a culpable lack of foresight in visualizing the forces behind the Revolution. Every effort was made by Lenin and Trotsky to bring about peace with the Allies. They were prepared to refuse to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany, and instead to continue the fight on the side of the Allies, but the Allies refused to recognize them ... Various interventional operations, mostly carried out on the plea of protecting Russia against the invasion from Germany, were inaugurated, but really, as we now see, they were carried out in the interests of the capitalist class in Russia. It seems incredible that such slender excuses for intervention should have been allowed to hold good for so long... [N]ow we find ourselves supporting partisan leaders in Russia by the supply of arms and munitions at the expense of the British taxpayer, and in addition we find our Government carrying on an inhuman and illegal blockade against the Russian people, the result of which during the coming winter months will indeed be terrible."Upon his return to England, Malone became active in the "Hands Off Russia" campaign, and in November 1919 he officially joined the proto-Communist British Socialist Party (BSP). Malone was soon being elected to the party's leadership through the patronage of Theodore Rothstein. In the summer of 1920, the BSP became the main constituent of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), and as a result, Malone became the first CPGB MP. He attended the London Communist Unity Convention held 31 July and 1 August 1921, at which he was elected to the new party's governing Central Committee. Malone's sudden conversion to revolutionary politics brought more questions than answers, and its genuineness was questioned. John Maclean claimed that Malone was a counter-revolutionary sent to disrupt the workers' movement, and he refused to speak alongside Malone.Official CPGB historian James Klugmann saw Malone as a leading figure in the party's first year of existence: "In the first months of the Party's existence Col. Malone was very active not only in Parliament, but addressing mass meetings and rallies all over the country. Whatever his theoretical weaknesses, he was a man of passion, moved by the revolutionary tremors that were shaking the world, full of wrath and indignation against the powers that be, and after a fiery speech in the Albert Hall on November 7, 1920, he was charged with sedition under Regulation 42 of the Defense of the Realm Act ... [h]e was sentenced to six months in the Second Division."The line which landed Malone in jail related to his argument that during a revolutionary crisis, excesses might occur resulting in the killing of some prominent members of the bourgeoisie. "What are a few Churchills or a few Curzons on lampposts compared to the massacre of thousands of human beings?", Malone asked his audience. Despite Malone's prosecution, the Communist Party did not disavow Malone's rhetorical flourish, going so far as to publish an official party pamphlet, entitled "What are a Few Churchills?" in January 1921. He was stripped of his OBE on 24 June 1921.Malone came to the attention of Special Branch, whose role it was to combat "Bolshevik subversion". He was frequently mentioned in reports to the cabinet on "Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom". Malone worked to promote the affiliation of the CPGB to the Labour Party, which was under consideration as a tactical matter, urged by Lenin. Malone was particularly keen and stated "There are still a few differences between the Communist Party and the Labour Party. I am glad to realise, however, that this will soon be settled by affiliation".Malone dissociated himself from the Communist Party of Great Britain and joined the Independent Labour Party, which was affiliated to the Labour Party, in 1922. He was the Labour candidate for Ashton-under-Lyne in the 1924 general election, but was unsuccessful. However, following the death of Arthur Holland in 1927, Malone was elected as MP for Northampton in the ensuing 1928 by-election. He was re-elected at the 1929 general election, and served in Ramsay MacDonald's government as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of Pensions, Frederick Roberts, in 1931. He was not re-elected in the 1931 general election.Malone returned to military service in the Second World War. In 1942 he was the staff officer to the chief warden of the City of Westminster Civil Defence. From 1943 to 1945 he served in the Admiralty Small Vessels Pool. Following the end of the war in 1945, he became the Vice President of the Royal Television Society, the founder and chairman of the Radio Association, and a fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society. By the time of his death his publications included "The Russian Republic", "New China", and "Manchukuo: Jewel of Asia".Malone married Leah Kay in 1921. After her death, he remarried in 1956. He died on 25 February 1965, aged 74.
|
[
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Cecil L'Estrange Malone hold in 1928-02-03?
|
February 03, 1928
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q5056185_P39_1
|
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Aug, 1920 to Oct, 1922.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom from May, 1929 to Oct, 1931.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1928 to May, 1929.
|
Cecil MaloneCecil John L'Estrange Malone (7 September 1890 – 25 February 1965) was a British politician and pioneer naval aviator who served as the United Kingdom's first Communist member of parliament.Malone was born in Dalton Holme, a parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, on 7 September 1890. He was the son of the Reverend Savile L'Estrange Malone and Frances Mary Faljomb. He was related to the sisters Constance Markievicz and Eva Gore-Booth.Malone was educated at Cordwalles School in Maidenhead before joining the Royal Navy in 1905 and went through officer training at Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. On 15 March 1910, he was confirmed as a sub-lieutenant having previously been acting in that rank. In 1911, he was part of the second course approved by the Admiralty to attend Naval Flying School, Eastchurch. He was promoted to lieutenant from sub-lieutenant on 15 December 1911.Malone earned his Royal Aero Club certificate (No. 195) on 12 March 1912. In the Army Manoeuvres of 1912, Malone flew a twin-engined triple-screwed Short biplane. He is also noted for flying off the forecastle of steaming .During World War I, Malone commanded Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) planes in the Cuxhaven Raid on 25 December 1914. From August 1914 to March 1915, he captained , a cross-channel steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. From March 1915 to April 1916, he captained , another steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. Under Malone's command, seaplanes from "Ben-my-Chree" were the first on record to carry torpedoes and they torpedoed three enemy vessels in 1916. Malone then took over command of the East Indies and Egypt Seaplane Squadron, for which he was awarded the Fourth Class of the Order of the Nile.Malone was appointed to the Plans Division of the Admiralty in 1918 before becoming the First British Air Attache at the Embassy of the United Kingdom, Paris. In this capacity, he was the Air Representative of the Supreme War Council in Versailles in 1918. He was awarded Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his war efforts.Malone was elected as the Coalition Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) for East Leyton at the 1918 general election. He was a member of the anti-communist Reconstruction Society and wrote a number of articles strongly criticising left-wing activists. As Adams and Wilson wrote, "his early career contained no hint of his subsequent espousal of the communist cause."On 13 September 1919, with a passport endorsed by the British Foreign Office in hand, Cecil Malone embarked on the "S.S. Arcturus" for Helsinki. There Malone, who intended to visit Soviet Russia despite the blockade of the country, unexpectedly met up with another individual planning on crossing over to Petrograd. After travelling by sea and land to the border, the pair managed to cross the frontier through deserted forests and marshland by foot, arriving at the Soviet border on Sunday, 28 September. The two arrived in Petrograd by train at 6 pm the following day. Malone met and spoke with key leaders of the trade union movement in Petrograd before proceeding by train to Moscow.In Moscow, Malone met with Maxim Litvinov, then a top official in the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, with whom he had a long discussion. He later met for an hour with foreign minister Georgii Chicherin. Malone's new friends arranged for him to accompany Red Army leader Leon Trotsky on an inspection of troops at Tula aboard Trotsky's special train. Accompanying Malone on the trip were the head of the Supreme Council of National Economy (VSNKh), Alexei Rykov; chief of food supply for the Russian Republic, Alexander Tsiurupa; and People's Commissar of Education Anatoly Lunacharsky.During his visit, detailed in his memoir, Malone toured factories and theatres, power stations and government offices. He found the mission of the Bolshevik government in attempting economic reconstruction to be compelling and emerged from his trip a committed communist. "The history of Allied negotiations and transactions with Russia appears to have been a chain of catastrophes and mistakes" he wrote:"...[I]t seems there was a culpable lack of foresight in visualizing the forces behind the Revolution. Every effort was made by Lenin and Trotsky to bring about peace with the Allies. They were prepared to refuse to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany, and instead to continue the fight on the side of the Allies, but the Allies refused to recognize them ... Various interventional operations, mostly carried out on the plea of protecting Russia against the invasion from Germany, were inaugurated, but really, as we now see, they were carried out in the interests of the capitalist class in Russia. It seems incredible that such slender excuses for intervention should have been allowed to hold good for so long... [N]ow we find ourselves supporting partisan leaders in Russia by the supply of arms and munitions at the expense of the British taxpayer, and in addition we find our Government carrying on an inhuman and illegal blockade against the Russian people, the result of which during the coming winter months will indeed be terrible."Upon his return to England, Malone became active in the "Hands Off Russia" campaign, and in November 1919 he officially joined the proto-Communist British Socialist Party (BSP). Malone was soon being elected to the party's leadership through the patronage of Theodore Rothstein. In the summer of 1920, the BSP became the main constituent of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), and as a result, Malone became the first CPGB MP. He attended the London Communist Unity Convention held 31 July and 1 August 1921, at which he was elected to the new party's governing Central Committee. Malone's sudden conversion to revolutionary politics brought more questions than answers, and its genuineness was questioned. John Maclean claimed that Malone was a counter-revolutionary sent to disrupt the workers' movement, and he refused to speak alongside Malone.Official CPGB historian James Klugmann saw Malone as a leading figure in the party's first year of existence: "In the first months of the Party's existence Col. Malone was very active not only in Parliament, but addressing mass meetings and rallies all over the country. Whatever his theoretical weaknesses, he was a man of passion, moved by the revolutionary tremors that were shaking the world, full of wrath and indignation against the powers that be, and after a fiery speech in the Albert Hall on November 7, 1920, he was charged with sedition under Regulation 42 of the Defense of the Realm Act ... [h]e was sentenced to six months in the Second Division."The line which landed Malone in jail related to his argument that during a revolutionary crisis, excesses might occur resulting in the killing of some prominent members of the bourgeoisie. "What are a few Churchills or a few Curzons on lampposts compared to the massacre of thousands of human beings?", Malone asked his audience. Despite Malone's prosecution, the Communist Party did not disavow Malone's rhetorical flourish, going so far as to publish an official party pamphlet, entitled "What are a Few Churchills?" in January 1921. He was stripped of his OBE on 24 June 1921.Malone came to the attention of Special Branch, whose role it was to combat "Bolshevik subversion". He was frequently mentioned in reports to the cabinet on "Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom". Malone worked to promote the affiliation of the CPGB to the Labour Party, which was under consideration as a tactical matter, urged by Lenin. Malone was particularly keen and stated "There are still a few differences between the Communist Party and the Labour Party. I am glad to realise, however, that this will soon be settled by affiliation".Malone dissociated himself from the Communist Party of Great Britain and joined the Independent Labour Party, which was affiliated to the Labour Party, in 1922. He was the Labour candidate for Ashton-under-Lyne in the 1924 general election, but was unsuccessful. However, following the death of Arthur Holland in 1927, Malone was elected as MP for Northampton in the ensuing 1928 by-election. He was re-elected at the 1929 general election, and served in Ramsay MacDonald's government as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of Pensions, Frederick Roberts, in 1931. He was not re-elected in the 1931 general election.Malone returned to military service in the Second World War. In 1942 he was the staff officer to the chief warden of the City of Westminster Civil Defence. From 1943 to 1945 he served in the Admiralty Small Vessels Pool. Following the end of the war in 1945, he became the Vice President of the Royal Television Society, the founder and chairman of the Radio Association, and a fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society. By the time of his death his publications included "The Russian Republic", "New China", and "Manchukuo: Jewel of Asia".Malone married Leah Kay in 1921. After her death, he remarried in 1956. He died on 25 February 1965, aged 74.
|
[
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Cecil L'Estrange Malone hold in 03/02/1928?
|
February 03, 1928
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q5056185_P39_1
|
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Aug, 1920 to Oct, 1922.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom from May, 1929 to Oct, 1931.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1928 to May, 1929.
|
Cecil MaloneCecil John L'Estrange Malone (7 September 1890 – 25 February 1965) was a British politician and pioneer naval aviator who served as the United Kingdom's first Communist member of parliament.Malone was born in Dalton Holme, a parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, on 7 September 1890. He was the son of the Reverend Savile L'Estrange Malone and Frances Mary Faljomb. He was related to the sisters Constance Markievicz and Eva Gore-Booth.Malone was educated at Cordwalles School in Maidenhead before joining the Royal Navy in 1905 and went through officer training at Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. On 15 March 1910, he was confirmed as a sub-lieutenant having previously been acting in that rank. In 1911, he was part of the second course approved by the Admiralty to attend Naval Flying School, Eastchurch. He was promoted to lieutenant from sub-lieutenant on 15 December 1911.Malone earned his Royal Aero Club certificate (No. 195) on 12 March 1912. In the Army Manoeuvres of 1912, Malone flew a twin-engined triple-screwed Short biplane. He is also noted for flying off the forecastle of steaming .During World War I, Malone commanded Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) planes in the Cuxhaven Raid on 25 December 1914. From August 1914 to March 1915, he captained , a cross-channel steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. From March 1915 to April 1916, he captained , another steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. Under Malone's command, seaplanes from "Ben-my-Chree" were the first on record to carry torpedoes and they torpedoed three enemy vessels in 1916. Malone then took over command of the East Indies and Egypt Seaplane Squadron, for which he was awarded the Fourth Class of the Order of the Nile.Malone was appointed to the Plans Division of the Admiralty in 1918 before becoming the First British Air Attache at the Embassy of the United Kingdom, Paris. In this capacity, he was the Air Representative of the Supreme War Council in Versailles in 1918. He was awarded Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his war efforts.Malone was elected as the Coalition Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) for East Leyton at the 1918 general election. He was a member of the anti-communist Reconstruction Society and wrote a number of articles strongly criticising left-wing activists. As Adams and Wilson wrote, "his early career contained no hint of his subsequent espousal of the communist cause."On 13 September 1919, with a passport endorsed by the British Foreign Office in hand, Cecil Malone embarked on the "S.S. Arcturus" for Helsinki. There Malone, who intended to visit Soviet Russia despite the blockade of the country, unexpectedly met up with another individual planning on crossing over to Petrograd. After travelling by sea and land to the border, the pair managed to cross the frontier through deserted forests and marshland by foot, arriving at the Soviet border on Sunday, 28 September. The two arrived in Petrograd by train at 6 pm the following day. Malone met and spoke with key leaders of the trade union movement in Petrograd before proceeding by train to Moscow.In Moscow, Malone met with Maxim Litvinov, then a top official in the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, with whom he had a long discussion. He later met for an hour with foreign minister Georgii Chicherin. Malone's new friends arranged for him to accompany Red Army leader Leon Trotsky on an inspection of troops at Tula aboard Trotsky's special train. Accompanying Malone on the trip were the head of the Supreme Council of National Economy (VSNKh), Alexei Rykov; chief of food supply for the Russian Republic, Alexander Tsiurupa; and People's Commissar of Education Anatoly Lunacharsky.During his visit, detailed in his memoir, Malone toured factories and theatres, power stations and government offices. He found the mission of the Bolshevik government in attempting economic reconstruction to be compelling and emerged from his trip a committed communist. "The history of Allied negotiations and transactions with Russia appears to have been a chain of catastrophes and mistakes" he wrote:"...[I]t seems there was a culpable lack of foresight in visualizing the forces behind the Revolution. Every effort was made by Lenin and Trotsky to bring about peace with the Allies. They were prepared to refuse to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany, and instead to continue the fight on the side of the Allies, but the Allies refused to recognize them ... Various interventional operations, mostly carried out on the plea of protecting Russia against the invasion from Germany, were inaugurated, but really, as we now see, they were carried out in the interests of the capitalist class in Russia. It seems incredible that such slender excuses for intervention should have been allowed to hold good for so long... [N]ow we find ourselves supporting partisan leaders in Russia by the supply of arms and munitions at the expense of the British taxpayer, and in addition we find our Government carrying on an inhuman and illegal blockade against the Russian people, the result of which during the coming winter months will indeed be terrible."Upon his return to England, Malone became active in the "Hands Off Russia" campaign, and in November 1919 he officially joined the proto-Communist British Socialist Party (BSP). Malone was soon being elected to the party's leadership through the patronage of Theodore Rothstein. In the summer of 1920, the BSP became the main constituent of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), and as a result, Malone became the first CPGB MP. He attended the London Communist Unity Convention held 31 July and 1 August 1921, at which he was elected to the new party's governing Central Committee. Malone's sudden conversion to revolutionary politics brought more questions than answers, and its genuineness was questioned. John Maclean claimed that Malone was a counter-revolutionary sent to disrupt the workers' movement, and he refused to speak alongside Malone.Official CPGB historian James Klugmann saw Malone as a leading figure in the party's first year of existence: "In the first months of the Party's existence Col. Malone was very active not only in Parliament, but addressing mass meetings and rallies all over the country. Whatever his theoretical weaknesses, he was a man of passion, moved by the revolutionary tremors that were shaking the world, full of wrath and indignation against the powers that be, and after a fiery speech in the Albert Hall on November 7, 1920, he was charged with sedition under Regulation 42 of the Defense of the Realm Act ... [h]e was sentenced to six months in the Second Division."The line which landed Malone in jail related to his argument that during a revolutionary crisis, excesses might occur resulting in the killing of some prominent members of the bourgeoisie. "What are a few Churchills or a few Curzons on lampposts compared to the massacre of thousands of human beings?", Malone asked his audience. Despite Malone's prosecution, the Communist Party did not disavow Malone's rhetorical flourish, going so far as to publish an official party pamphlet, entitled "What are a Few Churchills?" in January 1921. He was stripped of his OBE on 24 June 1921.Malone came to the attention of Special Branch, whose role it was to combat "Bolshevik subversion". He was frequently mentioned in reports to the cabinet on "Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom". Malone worked to promote the affiliation of the CPGB to the Labour Party, which was under consideration as a tactical matter, urged by Lenin. Malone was particularly keen and stated "There are still a few differences between the Communist Party and the Labour Party. I am glad to realise, however, that this will soon be settled by affiliation".Malone dissociated himself from the Communist Party of Great Britain and joined the Independent Labour Party, which was affiliated to the Labour Party, in 1922. He was the Labour candidate for Ashton-under-Lyne in the 1924 general election, but was unsuccessful. However, following the death of Arthur Holland in 1927, Malone was elected as MP for Northampton in the ensuing 1928 by-election. He was re-elected at the 1929 general election, and served in Ramsay MacDonald's government as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of Pensions, Frederick Roberts, in 1931. He was not re-elected in the 1931 general election.Malone returned to military service in the Second World War. In 1942 he was the staff officer to the chief warden of the City of Westminster Civil Defence. From 1943 to 1945 he served in the Admiralty Small Vessels Pool. Following the end of the war in 1945, he became the Vice President of the Royal Television Society, the founder and chairman of the Radio Association, and a fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society. By the time of his death his publications included "The Russian Republic", "New China", and "Manchukuo: Jewel of Asia".Malone married Leah Kay in 1921. After her death, he remarried in 1956. He died on 25 February 1965, aged 74.
|
[
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Cecil L'Estrange Malone hold in Feb 03, 1928?
|
February 03, 1928
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q5056185_P39_1
|
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Aug, 1920 to Oct, 1922.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom from May, 1929 to Oct, 1931.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1928 to May, 1929.
|
Cecil MaloneCecil John L'Estrange Malone (7 September 1890 – 25 February 1965) was a British politician and pioneer naval aviator who served as the United Kingdom's first Communist member of parliament.Malone was born in Dalton Holme, a parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, on 7 September 1890. He was the son of the Reverend Savile L'Estrange Malone and Frances Mary Faljomb. He was related to the sisters Constance Markievicz and Eva Gore-Booth.Malone was educated at Cordwalles School in Maidenhead before joining the Royal Navy in 1905 and went through officer training at Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. On 15 March 1910, he was confirmed as a sub-lieutenant having previously been acting in that rank. In 1911, he was part of the second course approved by the Admiralty to attend Naval Flying School, Eastchurch. He was promoted to lieutenant from sub-lieutenant on 15 December 1911.Malone earned his Royal Aero Club certificate (No. 195) on 12 March 1912. In the Army Manoeuvres of 1912, Malone flew a twin-engined triple-screwed Short biplane. He is also noted for flying off the forecastle of steaming .During World War I, Malone commanded Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) planes in the Cuxhaven Raid on 25 December 1914. From August 1914 to March 1915, he captained , a cross-channel steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. From March 1915 to April 1916, he captained , another steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. Under Malone's command, seaplanes from "Ben-my-Chree" were the first on record to carry torpedoes and they torpedoed three enemy vessels in 1916. Malone then took over command of the East Indies and Egypt Seaplane Squadron, for which he was awarded the Fourth Class of the Order of the Nile.Malone was appointed to the Plans Division of the Admiralty in 1918 before becoming the First British Air Attache at the Embassy of the United Kingdom, Paris. In this capacity, he was the Air Representative of the Supreme War Council in Versailles in 1918. He was awarded Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his war efforts.Malone was elected as the Coalition Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) for East Leyton at the 1918 general election. He was a member of the anti-communist Reconstruction Society and wrote a number of articles strongly criticising left-wing activists. As Adams and Wilson wrote, "his early career contained no hint of his subsequent espousal of the communist cause."On 13 September 1919, with a passport endorsed by the British Foreign Office in hand, Cecil Malone embarked on the "S.S. Arcturus" for Helsinki. There Malone, who intended to visit Soviet Russia despite the blockade of the country, unexpectedly met up with another individual planning on crossing over to Petrograd. After travelling by sea and land to the border, the pair managed to cross the frontier through deserted forests and marshland by foot, arriving at the Soviet border on Sunday, 28 September. The two arrived in Petrograd by train at 6 pm the following day. Malone met and spoke with key leaders of the trade union movement in Petrograd before proceeding by train to Moscow.In Moscow, Malone met with Maxim Litvinov, then a top official in the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, with whom he had a long discussion. He later met for an hour with foreign minister Georgii Chicherin. Malone's new friends arranged for him to accompany Red Army leader Leon Trotsky on an inspection of troops at Tula aboard Trotsky's special train. Accompanying Malone on the trip were the head of the Supreme Council of National Economy (VSNKh), Alexei Rykov; chief of food supply for the Russian Republic, Alexander Tsiurupa; and People's Commissar of Education Anatoly Lunacharsky.During his visit, detailed in his memoir, Malone toured factories and theatres, power stations and government offices. He found the mission of the Bolshevik government in attempting economic reconstruction to be compelling and emerged from his trip a committed communist. "The history of Allied negotiations and transactions with Russia appears to have been a chain of catastrophes and mistakes" he wrote:"...[I]t seems there was a culpable lack of foresight in visualizing the forces behind the Revolution. Every effort was made by Lenin and Trotsky to bring about peace with the Allies. They were prepared to refuse to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany, and instead to continue the fight on the side of the Allies, but the Allies refused to recognize them ... Various interventional operations, mostly carried out on the plea of protecting Russia against the invasion from Germany, were inaugurated, but really, as we now see, they were carried out in the interests of the capitalist class in Russia. It seems incredible that such slender excuses for intervention should have been allowed to hold good for so long... [N]ow we find ourselves supporting partisan leaders in Russia by the supply of arms and munitions at the expense of the British taxpayer, and in addition we find our Government carrying on an inhuman and illegal blockade against the Russian people, the result of which during the coming winter months will indeed be terrible."Upon his return to England, Malone became active in the "Hands Off Russia" campaign, and in November 1919 he officially joined the proto-Communist British Socialist Party (BSP). Malone was soon being elected to the party's leadership through the patronage of Theodore Rothstein. In the summer of 1920, the BSP became the main constituent of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), and as a result, Malone became the first CPGB MP. He attended the London Communist Unity Convention held 31 July and 1 August 1921, at which he was elected to the new party's governing Central Committee. Malone's sudden conversion to revolutionary politics brought more questions than answers, and its genuineness was questioned. John Maclean claimed that Malone was a counter-revolutionary sent to disrupt the workers' movement, and he refused to speak alongside Malone.Official CPGB historian James Klugmann saw Malone as a leading figure in the party's first year of existence: "In the first months of the Party's existence Col. Malone was very active not only in Parliament, but addressing mass meetings and rallies all over the country. Whatever his theoretical weaknesses, he was a man of passion, moved by the revolutionary tremors that were shaking the world, full of wrath and indignation against the powers that be, and after a fiery speech in the Albert Hall on November 7, 1920, he was charged with sedition under Regulation 42 of the Defense of the Realm Act ... [h]e was sentenced to six months in the Second Division."The line which landed Malone in jail related to his argument that during a revolutionary crisis, excesses might occur resulting in the killing of some prominent members of the bourgeoisie. "What are a few Churchills or a few Curzons on lampposts compared to the massacre of thousands of human beings?", Malone asked his audience. Despite Malone's prosecution, the Communist Party did not disavow Malone's rhetorical flourish, going so far as to publish an official party pamphlet, entitled "What are a Few Churchills?" in January 1921. He was stripped of his OBE on 24 June 1921.Malone came to the attention of Special Branch, whose role it was to combat "Bolshevik subversion". He was frequently mentioned in reports to the cabinet on "Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom". Malone worked to promote the affiliation of the CPGB to the Labour Party, which was under consideration as a tactical matter, urged by Lenin. Malone was particularly keen and stated "There are still a few differences between the Communist Party and the Labour Party. I am glad to realise, however, that this will soon be settled by affiliation".Malone dissociated himself from the Communist Party of Great Britain and joined the Independent Labour Party, which was affiliated to the Labour Party, in 1922. He was the Labour candidate for Ashton-under-Lyne in the 1924 general election, but was unsuccessful. However, following the death of Arthur Holland in 1927, Malone was elected as MP for Northampton in the ensuing 1928 by-election. He was re-elected at the 1929 general election, and served in Ramsay MacDonald's government as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of Pensions, Frederick Roberts, in 1931. He was not re-elected in the 1931 general election.Malone returned to military service in the Second World War. In 1942 he was the staff officer to the chief warden of the City of Westminster Civil Defence. From 1943 to 1945 he served in the Admiralty Small Vessels Pool. Following the end of the war in 1945, he became the Vice President of the Royal Television Society, the founder and chairman of the Radio Association, and a fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society. By the time of his death his publications included "The Russian Republic", "New China", and "Manchukuo: Jewel of Asia".Malone married Leah Kay in 1921. After her death, he remarried in 1956. He died on 25 February 1965, aged 74.
|
[
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Cecil L'Estrange Malone hold in 02/03/1928?
|
February 03, 1928
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q5056185_P39_1
|
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Aug, 1920 to Oct, 1922.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom from May, 1929 to Oct, 1931.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1928 to May, 1929.
|
Cecil MaloneCecil John L'Estrange Malone (7 September 1890 – 25 February 1965) was a British politician and pioneer naval aviator who served as the United Kingdom's first Communist member of parliament.Malone was born in Dalton Holme, a parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, on 7 September 1890. He was the son of the Reverend Savile L'Estrange Malone and Frances Mary Faljomb. He was related to the sisters Constance Markievicz and Eva Gore-Booth.Malone was educated at Cordwalles School in Maidenhead before joining the Royal Navy in 1905 and went through officer training at Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. On 15 March 1910, he was confirmed as a sub-lieutenant having previously been acting in that rank. In 1911, he was part of the second course approved by the Admiralty to attend Naval Flying School, Eastchurch. He was promoted to lieutenant from sub-lieutenant on 15 December 1911.Malone earned his Royal Aero Club certificate (No. 195) on 12 March 1912. In the Army Manoeuvres of 1912, Malone flew a twin-engined triple-screwed Short biplane. He is also noted for flying off the forecastle of steaming .During World War I, Malone commanded Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) planes in the Cuxhaven Raid on 25 December 1914. From August 1914 to March 1915, he captained , a cross-channel steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. From March 1915 to April 1916, he captained , another steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. Under Malone's command, seaplanes from "Ben-my-Chree" were the first on record to carry torpedoes and they torpedoed three enemy vessels in 1916. Malone then took over command of the East Indies and Egypt Seaplane Squadron, for which he was awarded the Fourth Class of the Order of the Nile.Malone was appointed to the Plans Division of the Admiralty in 1918 before becoming the First British Air Attache at the Embassy of the United Kingdom, Paris. In this capacity, he was the Air Representative of the Supreme War Council in Versailles in 1918. He was awarded Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his war efforts.Malone was elected as the Coalition Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) for East Leyton at the 1918 general election. He was a member of the anti-communist Reconstruction Society and wrote a number of articles strongly criticising left-wing activists. As Adams and Wilson wrote, "his early career contained no hint of his subsequent espousal of the communist cause."On 13 September 1919, with a passport endorsed by the British Foreign Office in hand, Cecil Malone embarked on the "S.S. Arcturus" for Helsinki. There Malone, who intended to visit Soviet Russia despite the blockade of the country, unexpectedly met up with another individual planning on crossing over to Petrograd. After travelling by sea and land to the border, the pair managed to cross the frontier through deserted forests and marshland by foot, arriving at the Soviet border on Sunday, 28 September. The two arrived in Petrograd by train at 6 pm the following day. Malone met and spoke with key leaders of the trade union movement in Petrograd before proceeding by train to Moscow.In Moscow, Malone met with Maxim Litvinov, then a top official in the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, with whom he had a long discussion. He later met for an hour with foreign minister Georgii Chicherin. Malone's new friends arranged for him to accompany Red Army leader Leon Trotsky on an inspection of troops at Tula aboard Trotsky's special train. Accompanying Malone on the trip were the head of the Supreme Council of National Economy (VSNKh), Alexei Rykov; chief of food supply for the Russian Republic, Alexander Tsiurupa; and People's Commissar of Education Anatoly Lunacharsky.During his visit, detailed in his memoir, Malone toured factories and theatres, power stations and government offices. He found the mission of the Bolshevik government in attempting economic reconstruction to be compelling and emerged from his trip a committed communist. "The history of Allied negotiations and transactions with Russia appears to have been a chain of catastrophes and mistakes" he wrote:"...[I]t seems there was a culpable lack of foresight in visualizing the forces behind the Revolution. Every effort was made by Lenin and Trotsky to bring about peace with the Allies. They were prepared to refuse to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany, and instead to continue the fight on the side of the Allies, but the Allies refused to recognize them ... Various interventional operations, mostly carried out on the plea of protecting Russia against the invasion from Germany, were inaugurated, but really, as we now see, they were carried out in the interests of the capitalist class in Russia. It seems incredible that such slender excuses for intervention should have been allowed to hold good for so long... [N]ow we find ourselves supporting partisan leaders in Russia by the supply of arms and munitions at the expense of the British taxpayer, and in addition we find our Government carrying on an inhuman and illegal blockade against the Russian people, the result of which during the coming winter months will indeed be terrible."Upon his return to England, Malone became active in the "Hands Off Russia" campaign, and in November 1919 he officially joined the proto-Communist British Socialist Party (BSP). Malone was soon being elected to the party's leadership through the patronage of Theodore Rothstein. In the summer of 1920, the BSP became the main constituent of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), and as a result, Malone became the first CPGB MP. He attended the London Communist Unity Convention held 31 July and 1 August 1921, at which he was elected to the new party's governing Central Committee. Malone's sudden conversion to revolutionary politics brought more questions than answers, and its genuineness was questioned. John Maclean claimed that Malone was a counter-revolutionary sent to disrupt the workers' movement, and he refused to speak alongside Malone.Official CPGB historian James Klugmann saw Malone as a leading figure in the party's first year of existence: "In the first months of the Party's existence Col. Malone was very active not only in Parliament, but addressing mass meetings and rallies all over the country. Whatever his theoretical weaknesses, he was a man of passion, moved by the revolutionary tremors that were shaking the world, full of wrath and indignation against the powers that be, and after a fiery speech in the Albert Hall on November 7, 1920, he was charged with sedition under Regulation 42 of the Defense of the Realm Act ... [h]e was sentenced to six months in the Second Division."The line which landed Malone in jail related to his argument that during a revolutionary crisis, excesses might occur resulting in the killing of some prominent members of the bourgeoisie. "What are a few Churchills or a few Curzons on lampposts compared to the massacre of thousands of human beings?", Malone asked his audience. Despite Malone's prosecution, the Communist Party did not disavow Malone's rhetorical flourish, going so far as to publish an official party pamphlet, entitled "What are a Few Churchills?" in January 1921. He was stripped of his OBE on 24 June 1921.Malone came to the attention of Special Branch, whose role it was to combat "Bolshevik subversion". He was frequently mentioned in reports to the cabinet on "Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom". Malone worked to promote the affiliation of the CPGB to the Labour Party, which was under consideration as a tactical matter, urged by Lenin. Malone was particularly keen and stated "There are still a few differences between the Communist Party and the Labour Party. I am glad to realise, however, that this will soon be settled by affiliation".Malone dissociated himself from the Communist Party of Great Britain and joined the Independent Labour Party, which was affiliated to the Labour Party, in 1922. He was the Labour candidate for Ashton-under-Lyne in the 1924 general election, but was unsuccessful. However, following the death of Arthur Holland in 1927, Malone was elected as MP for Northampton in the ensuing 1928 by-election. He was re-elected at the 1929 general election, and served in Ramsay MacDonald's government as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of Pensions, Frederick Roberts, in 1931. He was not re-elected in the 1931 general election.Malone returned to military service in the Second World War. In 1942 he was the staff officer to the chief warden of the City of Westminster Civil Defence. From 1943 to 1945 he served in the Admiralty Small Vessels Pool. Following the end of the war in 1945, he became the Vice President of the Royal Television Society, the founder and chairman of the Radio Association, and a fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society. By the time of his death his publications included "The Russian Republic", "New China", and "Manchukuo: Jewel of Asia".Malone married Leah Kay in 1921. After her death, he remarried in 1956. He died on 25 February 1965, aged 74.
|
[
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which position did Cecil L'Estrange Malone hold in 03-Feb-192803-February-1928?
|
February 03, 1928
|
{
"text": [
"Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
]
}
|
L2_Q5056185_P39_1
|
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom from Aug, 1920 to Oct, 1922.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom from May, 1929 to Oct, 1931.
Cecil L'Estrange Malone holds the position of Member of the 34th Parliament of the United Kingdom from Jan, 1928 to May, 1929.
|
Cecil MaloneCecil John L'Estrange Malone (7 September 1890 – 25 February 1965) was a British politician and pioneer naval aviator who served as the United Kingdom's first Communist member of parliament.Malone was born in Dalton Holme, a parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, on 7 September 1890. He was the son of the Reverend Savile L'Estrange Malone and Frances Mary Faljomb. He was related to the sisters Constance Markievicz and Eva Gore-Booth.Malone was educated at Cordwalles School in Maidenhead before joining the Royal Navy in 1905 and went through officer training at Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. On 15 March 1910, he was confirmed as a sub-lieutenant having previously been acting in that rank. In 1911, he was part of the second course approved by the Admiralty to attend Naval Flying School, Eastchurch. He was promoted to lieutenant from sub-lieutenant on 15 December 1911.Malone earned his Royal Aero Club certificate (No. 195) on 12 March 1912. In the Army Manoeuvres of 1912, Malone flew a twin-engined triple-screwed Short biplane. He is also noted for flying off the forecastle of steaming .During World War I, Malone commanded Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) planes in the Cuxhaven Raid on 25 December 1914. From August 1914 to March 1915, he captained , a cross-channel steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. From March 1915 to April 1916, he captained , another steamer converted to a seaplane carrier. Under Malone's command, seaplanes from "Ben-my-Chree" were the first on record to carry torpedoes and they torpedoed three enemy vessels in 1916. Malone then took over command of the East Indies and Egypt Seaplane Squadron, for which he was awarded the Fourth Class of the Order of the Nile.Malone was appointed to the Plans Division of the Admiralty in 1918 before becoming the First British Air Attache at the Embassy of the United Kingdom, Paris. In this capacity, he was the Air Representative of the Supreme War Council in Versailles in 1918. He was awarded Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his war efforts.Malone was elected as the Coalition Liberal Member of Parliament (MP) for East Leyton at the 1918 general election. He was a member of the anti-communist Reconstruction Society and wrote a number of articles strongly criticising left-wing activists. As Adams and Wilson wrote, "his early career contained no hint of his subsequent espousal of the communist cause."On 13 September 1919, with a passport endorsed by the British Foreign Office in hand, Cecil Malone embarked on the "S.S. Arcturus" for Helsinki. There Malone, who intended to visit Soviet Russia despite the blockade of the country, unexpectedly met up with another individual planning on crossing over to Petrograd. After travelling by sea and land to the border, the pair managed to cross the frontier through deserted forests and marshland by foot, arriving at the Soviet border on Sunday, 28 September. The two arrived in Petrograd by train at 6 pm the following day. Malone met and spoke with key leaders of the trade union movement in Petrograd before proceeding by train to Moscow.In Moscow, Malone met with Maxim Litvinov, then a top official in the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs, with whom he had a long discussion. He later met for an hour with foreign minister Georgii Chicherin. Malone's new friends arranged for him to accompany Red Army leader Leon Trotsky on an inspection of troops at Tula aboard Trotsky's special train. Accompanying Malone on the trip were the head of the Supreme Council of National Economy (VSNKh), Alexei Rykov; chief of food supply for the Russian Republic, Alexander Tsiurupa; and People's Commissar of Education Anatoly Lunacharsky.During his visit, detailed in his memoir, Malone toured factories and theatres, power stations and government offices. He found the mission of the Bolshevik government in attempting economic reconstruction to be compelling and emerged from his trip a committed communist. "The history of Allied negotiations and transactions with Russia appears to have been a chain of catastrophes and mistakes" he wrote:"...[I]t seems there was a culpable lack of foresight in visualizing the forces behind the Revolution. Every effort was made by Lenin and Trotsky to bring about peace with the Allies. They were prepared to refuse to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk with Germany, and instead to continue the fight on the side of the Allies, but the Allies refused to recognize them ... Various interventional operations, mostly carried out on the plea of protecting Russia against the invasion from Germany, were inaugurated, but really, as we now see, they were carried out in the interests of the capitalist class in Russia. It seems incredible that such slender excuses for intervention should have been allowed to hold good for so long... [N]ow we find ourselves supporting partisan leaders in Russia by the supply of arms and munitions at the expense of the British taxpayer, and in addition we find our Government carrying on an inhuman and illegal blockade against the Russian people, the result of which during the coming winter months will indeed be terrible."Upon his return to England, Malone became active in the "Hands Off Russia" campaign, and in November 1919 he officially joined the proto-Communist British Socialist Party (BSP). Malone was soon being elected to the party's leadership through the patronage of Theodore Rothstein. In the summer of 1920, the BSP became the main constituent of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB), and as a result, Malone became the first CPGB MP. He attended the London Communist Unity Convention held 31 July and 1 August 1921, at which he was elected to the new party's governing Central Committee. Malone's sudden conversion to revolutionary politics brought more questions than answers, and its genuineness was questioned. John Maclean claimed that Malone was a counter-revolutionary sent to disrupt the workers' movement, and he refused to speak alongside Malone.Official CPGB historian James Klugmann saw Malone as a leading figure in the party's first year of existence: "In the first months of the Party's existence Col. Malone was very active not only in Parliament, but addressing mass meetings and rallies all over the country. Whatever his theoretical weaknesses, he was a man of passion, moved by the revolutionary tremors that were shaking the world, full of wrath and indignation against the powers that be, and after a fiery speech in the Albert Hall on November 7, 1920, he was charged with sedition under Regulation 42 of the Defense of the Realm Act ... [h]e was sentenced to six months in the Second Division."The line which landed Malone in jail related to his argument that during a revolutionary crisis, excesses might occur resulting in the killing of some prominent members of the bourgeoisie. "What are a few Churchills or a few Curzons on lampposts compared to the massacre of thousands of human beings?", Malone asked his audience. Despite Malone's prosecution, the Communist Party did not disavow Malone's rhetorical flourish, going so far as to publish an official party pamphlet, entitled "What are a Few Churchills?" in January 1921. He was stripped of his OBE on 24 June 1921.Malone came to the attention of Special Branch, whose role it was to combat "Bolshevik subversion". He was frequently mentioned in reports to the cabinet on "Revolutionary Organisations in the United Kingdom". Malone worked to promote the affiliation of the CPGB to the Labour Party, which was under consideration as a tactical matter, urged by Lenin. Malone was particularly keen and stated "There are still a few differences between the Communist Party and the Labour Party. I am glad to realise, however, that this will soon be settled by affiliation".Malone dissociated himself from the Communist Party of Great Britain and joined the Independent Labour Party, which was affiliated to the Labour Party, in 1922. He was the Labour candidate for Ashton-under-Lyne in the 1924 general election, but was unsuccessful. However, following the death of Arthur Holland in 1927, Malone was elected as MP for Northampton in the ensuing 1928 by-election. He was re-elected at the 1929 general election, and served in Ramsay MacDonald's government as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to the Minister of Pensions, Frederick Roberts, in 1931. He was not re-elected in the 1931 general election.Malone returned to military service in the Second World War. In 1942 he was the staff officer to the chief warden of the City of Westminster Civil Defence. From 1943 to 1945 he served in the Admiralty Small Vessels Pool. Following the end of the war in 1945, he became the Vice President of the Royal Television Society, the founder and chairman of the Radio Association, and a fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society. By the time of his death his publications included "The Russian Republic", "New China", and "Manchukuo: Jewel of Asia".Malone married Leah Kay in 1921. After her death, he remarried in 1956. He died on 25 February 1965, aged 74.
|
[
"Member of the 31st Parliament of the United Kingdom",
"Member of the 35th Parliament of the United Kingdom"
] |
|
Which team did Eric Kwekeu play for in Jan, 2003?
|
January 01, 2003
|
{
"text": [
"Cameroon national football team",
"Bamboutos FC"
]
}
|
L2_Q547729_P54_1
|
Eric Kwekeu plays for Union Douala from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2008.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Bamboutos FC from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2005.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Cameroon national football team from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2003.
Eric Kwekeu plays for AS Mangasport from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2011.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Sapins FC from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2014.
|
Eric KwekeuEric Kwekeu (born 11 March 1980 in Yaoundé) is a professional Cameroonian footballer currently playing for Sapins.He was member of the national team at 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup; he played one match against United States at the tournament. In is his only cap with the senior national team.
|
[
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport",
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport"
] |
|
Which team did Eric Kwekeu play for in 2003-01-01?
|
January 01, 2003
|
{
"text": [
"Cameroon national football team",
"Bamboutos FC"
]
}
|
L2_Q547729_P54_1
|
Eric Kwekeu plays for Union Douala from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2008.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Bamboutos FC from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2005.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Cameroon national football team from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2003.
Eric Kwekeu plays for AS Mangasport from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2011.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Sapins FC from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2014.
|
Eric KwekeuEric Kwekeu (born 11 March 1980 in Yaoundé) is a professional Cameroonian footballer currently playing for Sapins.He was member of the national team at 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup; he played one match against United States at the tournament. In is his only cap with the senior national team.
|
[
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport",
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport"
] |
|
Which team did Eric Kwekeu play for in 01/01/2003?
|
January 01, 2003
|
{
"text": [
"Cameroon national football team",
"Bamboutos FC"
]
}
|
L2_Q547729_P54_1
|
Eric Kwekeu plays for Union Douala from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2008.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Bamboutos FC from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2005.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Cameroon national football team from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2003.
Eric Kwekeu plays for AS Mangasport from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2011.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Sapins FC from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2014.
|
Eric KwekeuEric Kwekeu (born 11 March 1980 in Yaoundé) is a professional Cameroonian footballer currently playing for Sapins.He was member of the national team at 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup; he played one match against United States at the tournament. In is his only cap with the senior national team.
|
[
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport",
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport"
] |
|
Which team did Eric Kwekeu play for in Jan 01, 2003?
|
January 01, 2003
|
{
"text": [
"Cameroon national football team",
"Bamboutos FC"
]
}
|
L2_Q547729_P54_1
|
Eric Kwekeu plays for Union Douala from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2008.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Bamboutos FC from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2005.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Cameroon national football team from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2003.
Eric Kwekeu plays for AS Mangasport from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2011.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Sapins FC from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2014.
|
Eric KwekeuEric Kwekeu (born 11 March 1980 in Yaoundé) is a professional Cameroonian footballer currently playing for Sapins.He was member of the national team at 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup; he played one match against United States at the tournament. In is his only cap with the senior national team.
|
[
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport",
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport"
] |
|
Which team did Eric Kwekeu play for in 01/01/2003?
|
January 01, 2003
|
{
"text": [
"Cameroon national football team",
"Bamboutos FC"
]
}
|
L2_Q547729_P54_1
|
Eric Kwekeu plays for Union Douala from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2008.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Bamboutos FC from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2005.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Cameroon national football team from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2003.
Eric Kwekeu plays for AS Mangasport from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2011.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Sapins FC from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2014.
|
Eric KwekeuEric Kwekeu (born 11 March 1980 in Yaoundé) is a professional Cameroonian footballer currently playing for Sapins.He was member of the national team at 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup; he played one match against United States at the tournament. In is his only cap with the senior national team.
|
[
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport",
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport"
] |
|
Which team did Eric Kwekeu play for in 01-Jan-200301-January-2003?
|
January 01, 2003
|
{
"text": [
"Cameroon national football team",
"Bamboutos FC"
]
}
|
L2_Q547729_P54_1
|
Eric Kwekeu plays for Union Douala from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2008.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Bamboutos FC from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2005.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Cameroon national football team from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2003.
Eric Kwekeu plays for AS Mangasport from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2011.
Eric Kwekeu plays for Sapins FC from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2014.
|
Eric KwekeuEric Kwekeu (born 11 March 1980 in Yaoundé) is a professional Cameroonian footballer currently playing for Sapins.He was member of the national team at 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup; he played one match against United States at the tournament. In is his only cap with the senior national team.
|
[
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport",
"Union Douala",
"Sapins FC",
"AS Mangasport"
] |
|
Which team did Neil Redfearn play for in Oct, 1989?
|
October 12, 1989
|
{
"text": [
"Watford F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q6065586_P54_4
|
Neil Redfearn plays for Charlton Athletic F.C. from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 1999.
Neil Redfearn plays for Frickley Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Barnsley F.C. from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1998.
Neil Redfearn plays for Boston United F.C. from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Rochdale A.F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C. from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Salford City F.C. from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bridlington Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Scarborough F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2006.
Neil Redfearn plays for Doncaster Rovers F.C. from Jan, 1986 to Jan, 1987.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford City A.F.C. from Jan, 1999 to Jan, 2000.
Neil Redfearn plays for Crystal Palace F.C. from Jan, 1987 to Jan, 1989.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bolton Wanderers F.C. from Jan, 1982 to Jan, 1984.
Neil Redfearn plays for Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Oldham Athletic A.F.C. from Jan, 1990 to Jan, 1991.
Neil Redfearn plays for Wigan Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2001.
Neil Redfearn plays for A.F.C. Emley from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Lincoln City F.C. from Jan, 1984 to Jan, 1986.
Neil Redfearn plays for Halifax Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2002.
Neil Redfearn plays for Watford F.C. from Jan, 1989 to Jan, 1990.
|
Neil RedfearnNeil David Redfearn (born 20 June 1965) is an English former professional footballer who played as a midfielder, and is currently head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn played 790 matches in the Football League, the fifth highest total of all-time, and more than a thousand first team games overall in a career that has spanned 24 years. He has had spells as caretaker manager of Halifax Town and York City and as manager of Scarborough, Northwich Victoria and Leeds United.Born in Dewsbury, West Riding of Yorkshire, Redfearn began his career at Bolton Wanderers on 23 June 1982, having previously been on the books of Nottingham Forest's youth team. He later made his name as goalscoring midfielder at lower-division sides Lincoln City and Doncaster Rovers. In May 1985 he was to witness a nightmare when 56 spectators were killed in a horrendous stand fire while playing for Lincoln against Bradford City. In 1987, he was signed by Crystal Palace for £100,000, and he later played for Watford, before moving again in 1989 to Oldham Athletic.Redfearn's last season with Oldham constituted a career highlight as he was an ever-present in the team that won the Second Division title and returned the Latics to the top-flight of English football after a gap of 68 years. Redfearn converted the injury time penalty kick in the final game of the season against Sheffield Wednesday that completed a 3–2 victory (after Oldham had trailed 2–0), and snatched the championship from West Ham United, who had prematurely been handed the trophy some 15 minutes earlier. Despite his contribution to Oldham's promotion, he became surplus to requirements with the re-signing of former club captain Mike Milligan from Everton in the off-season and Redfearn was transferred without playing for Oldham in the top flight.In September 1991, Redfearn joined Barnsley, and it was at this club he arguably spent his prime years. In his seven seasons at Oakwell, he rarely missed a single game, and was named club captain and penalty taker. In the 1996–97 season, Redfearn scored 17 goals as Barnsley won promotion to the FA Premier League for the first time in the club's history. Redfearn missed only one game, and was Barnsley's top scorer with ten league goals in the 1997–98 season. These included Barnsley's first ever top division goal on the opening day of the season, when he put them ahead in the ninth minute at home to West Ham United, although they ended up losing the game 2–1.It was not enough to save them though, as Barnsley were relegated that season. However, despite being in his thirties, Redfearn's performances had made him a wanted man in the Premier League, and he was signed by Charlton Athletic for £1 million in the summer of 1998. He left Barnsley having played 338 first team games, scoring 84 goals.In the 1998–99 season, his family did not settle in London, and at the end of the season, Redfearn jumped at the chance of returning to his native Yorkshire, when Bradford City paid £250,000 for his services. Redfearn did not make much impact at Bradford, scoring just once against Leicester City, and joined his 10th team, Wigan Athletic after just nine months in Bradford. Despite a very good goalscoring record, Redfearn never became first-choice at Wigan either, and he dropped down two divisions to join Halifax Town in 2001.At Halifax, he also got his first taste of management, being appointed caretaker manager alongside Tony Parks following the resignation of Paul Bracewell on 30 August 2001. His spell as caretaker manager came to an end on 12 October following the appointment of Alan Little. Redfearn started a second spell in caretaker charge on 4 March 2002 due to the enforced absence of Little. However, his contract with the club was terminated on 25 April and having been snubbed for the permanent manager's job he joined Boston United as player-coach.Redfearn spent the better part of two years at Boston, before finishing his Football League career at Rochdale in the spring of 2004. Rochdale did not offer him a new contract at the end of the season, meaning he finished his Football League career with 790 appearances and so being fifth in the all-time list of most Football League appearances. His last league appearance for Rochdale took his total to . after which Redfearn dropped down to the Conference, where he became player-coach at Scarborough, managed at the time by his former Oldham teammate Nick Henry. He signed a new contract with Scarborough in April 2005. When Henry was dismissed on 24 October 2005 Redfearn was named caretaker manager, before being appointed permanently on 1 November while remaining registered as a player. Redfearn resigned on 6 July 2006 after Mark Patterson was brought in as assistant manager. He subsequently signed with Northern Premier League First Division side Bradford Park Avenue later that month. He made his 1,000th competitive appearance on 4 November 2006, when Bradford Park Avenue faced Solihull Borough in the second qualifying round of the FA Trophy.Redfearn quit Bradford Park Avenue in March 2007, joining Northern Premier League First Division rivals Stocksbridge Park Steels, but left on 19 June to become manager of Conference Premier side Northwich Victoria. He resigned on 17 September 2007, after the club only managed one point from their first nine games, leaving them bottom of the Conference Premier.He joined Northern Premier League Premier Division club Frickley Athletic as a player in September 2007. He left the club over a month later to join Bridlington Town on 5 November. He left them in January 2008 after the departure of manager Ash Berry. He was appointed as York City's youth team coach in February. He joined Emley in July, where he would play when his commitments with York's youth team allowed. Redfearn moved onto Salford City of the Northern Premier League Division One North in October 2008. He took over as caretaker manager at York on 21 November 2008, following Colin Walker's dismissal, and was in charge for the team's 2–2 draw against Crawley Town. Following Martin Foyle's appointment as manager on 24 November, Redfearn took up the position of assistant manager at the club.Redfearn left York over a month later after being appointed coach of the under-18 academy team at Leeds United on 30 December 2008 and he assumed this role on 1 January 2009. He took over as manager of the Leeds reserve team in December 2010 following the dismissal of Neil Thompson. He was appointed caretaker manager at Leeds following the dismissal of manager Simon Grayson on 1 February 2012. Three days later he won his first match in charge by beating Bristol City 3–0. It was later confirmed by club chairman Ken Bates that Redfearn would retain the managerial post for the following three games. After two wins and two defeats in his four-game spell as manager, Redfearn was replaced as manager by Neil Warnock as permanent manager on 18 February 2012. In April 2012, Redfearn guided Leeds' Under 18's side to a second-place finish in the Under-18s League, narrowly missing out on top spot to Newcastle's Under-18s team.Following the departure of Neil Warnock on 1 April 2013, Redfearn again took charge of the first team for the game at for the 2–1 away defeat against Charlton Athletic on 6 April. In April 2013 manager Brian McDermott announced that Redfearn would become the new First Team Coach as well as combining his role as Reserve Team/Development Squad manager. When McDermott left in May 2014 Redfearn stood down from his role of first team coach to continue his role as reserve team/development squad manager as well as his role of Academy Manager.Redfearn's spell as the Head of Academy was heavily praised due to the influx of Leeds academy players breaking through into the first team such as Dominic Poleon, Chris Dawson, Sam Byram, Alex Mowatt, Lewis Cook and Kalvin Phillips.On 28 August 2014, Redfearn was appointed caretaker head coach after head coach Dave Hockaday and his assistant Junior Lewis were dismissed by owner Massimo Cellino, having been in the job for only 70 days. This was the third time Redfearn had been appointed as a caretaker manager/head coach of Leeds. Redfearn picked up a victory in his first game back in charge with a 1–0 win on 30 August against Bolton Wanderers. On 20 September, Redfearn's Leeds picked up a 3–0 win over local rivals Huddersfield Town. After recording a record of three wins and one draw in his latest stint as caretaker, Leeds announced that Redfearn would be stepping back down into a role described as "Academy manager and head of coaching." with Darko Milanič appointed the new head coach of Leeds on a two-year deal replacing previous head coach Dave Hockaday, he was joined at Leeds by his SK Sturm Graz Assistant Novica Nikčević.On 25 October 2014, Milanič was dismissed by the club after only 32 days in charge. Cellino confirmed that Redfearn would be appointed as Leeds' new head coach. On 27 October 2014 Redfearn confirmed that he verbally agreed to become head coach of Leeds after receiving reassurances that if it does not work out, he will revert to his previous job back in the academy. On 1 November 2014, Redfearn was confirmed as the club's new head coach, on an initial 12-month contract with the option of a further 12 months, the contract also had a clause that would see Redfearn return to the academy if he was to leave his role as head coach. On 18 December 2014, Steve Thompson was hired as Redfearn's new assistant manager.After a change in formation, with Redfearn playing a 4–2–3–1 formation, 2015 saw Leeds pick up an upturn in form, helping Leeds climb from towards the relegation zone positions to a midtable position.On 2 April 2015, Redfearn's assistant Steve Thompson was suspended by Leeds for an 'internal matter' by Leeds Sporting Director Nicola Salerno, with Redfearn advising he was kept in the dark as to the reason's why Thompson had been suspended.Also on 2 April 2015, a story emerged that Redfearn had been put under pressure to 'not select' top scorer Mirco Antenucci, because Antenucci's contract featured a clause of an extra year on his contract, should he score 12 goals in his first season. Antenucci's agent Silvio Pagliari confirmed the clause was correct. Despite this, Redfearn started Antenucci, with Antenucci making a relatively rare start against Wolverhampton Wanderers on 6 April in a 4–3 defeat. On 24 June 2015, former Sporting Director Nicola Salerno proclaimed the decision to not play Antenucci prior was Redfearn's decision.On 9 April, after rumoured Premier League interest in Alex Mowatt and teammates Lewis Cook, Charlie Taylor and Sam Byram, Redfearn challenged Leeds United's owners to keep a hold of their home grown talents.On 18 April 2015, 6 of Owner Massimo Cellino's signings (Mirco Antenucci, Giuseppe Bellusci, Souleymane Doukara, Dario Del Fabro, Marco Silvestri and Edgar Cani) controversially pulled out of the squad with an 'injury' the day before a 2–1 loss against Charlton Athletic.On 14 May 2015, Owner Massimo Cellino carried out a press conference unveiling Adam Pearson as the club's Executive Director to work directly alongside Cellino. The press conference included Cellino leaving halfway through for a cigarette break only to return, and for the press conference to run for over an hour, with Cellino refusing to reveal the future of Redfearn.However, on 16 May, with speculation mounting further about his future as Leeds United Head Coach, Cellino in an interview with The Sunday Mirror proclaimed Redfearn to be 'weak' and 'a baby'.On 20 May 2015, Leeds announced Uwe Rösler as the new head coach, thus ending Redfearn's reign at the club, with no announcement made of Redfearn's departure as head coach, Leeds Executive Director Adam Pearson revealed in the Rosler press conference that Redfearn had been offered back his previous role as Academy Director.On 10 June 2015, Redfearn had accepted to return to his role at the academy. On 16 July 2015, Redfearn resigned as academy director.On 9 October 2015, Redfearn was appointed manager of Championship club Rotherham United on a two-and-a-half-year deal. He was dismissed as manager on 8 February 2016, with Rotherham 22nd in the table.On 29 December 2017, Doncaster Rovers Belles announced the appointment of Redfearn as their new manager. On 13 May 2018, the Belles won the FA WSL 2 title, their first trophy since 1994.On 12 June 2018, he was appointed as the new manager of Liverpool Women (then Liverpool Ladies). His first and ultimately only match in charge ended in a sobering 5–0 loss to Arsenal Women. He resigned on 14 September 2018 after just one game in charge.On 2 October 2018, Redfearn was appointed as the new assistant coach of Ben Dawson at Newcastle United U23.On 21 June 2019, Redfearn was promoted to the role of Newcastle United U23 head coach.On 4 July 2019, Redfearn was announced as the caretaker head coach, assisted by Ben Dawson after the departure of manager Rafael Benítez on 30 June. He took charge of first team training for the 2019/20 pre-season. On 5 November 2019, Redfearn stepped down from this position.On 28 August 2020, Redfearn was announced as the new head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn's father, Brian, is a former professional footballer. He is a lifelong Leeds fan. Redfearn married Susan Roberts in Dewsbury in 1985.Oldham AthleticDoncaster Rovers Belles
|
[
"Bradford City A.F.C.",
"Doncaster Rovers F.C.",
"Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C.",
"Salford City F.C.",
"Bolton Wanderers F.C.",
"Frickley Athletic F.C.",
"Barnsley F.C.",
"Scarborough F.C.",
"Boston United F.C.",
"A.F.C. Emley",
"Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C.",
"Crystal Palace F.C.",
"Rochdale A.F.C.",
"Charlton Athletic F.C.",
"Lincoln City F.C.",
"Halifax Town A.F.C.",
"Oldham Athletic A.F.C.",
"Bridlington Town A.F.C.",
"Wigan Athletic F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Neil Redfearn play for in 1989-10-12?
|
October 12, 1989
|
{
"text": [
"Watford F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q6065586_P54_4
|
Neil Redfearn plays for Charlton Athletic F.C. from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 1999.
Neil Redfearn plays for Frickley Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Barnsley F.C. from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1998.
Neil Redfearn plays for Boston United F.C. from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Rochdale A.F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C. from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Salford City F.C. from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bridlington Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Scarborough F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2006.
Neil Redfearn plays for Doncaster Rovers F.C. from Jan, 1986 to Jan, 1987.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford City A.F.C. from Jan, 1999 to Jan, 2000.
Neil Redfearn plays for Crystal Palace F.C. from Jan, 1987 to Jan, 1989.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bolton Wanderers F.C. from Jan, 1982 to Jan, 1984.
Neil Redfearn plays for Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Oldham Athletic A.F.C. from Jan, 1990 to Jan, 1991.
Neil Redfearn plays for Wigan Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2001.
Neil Redfearn plays for A.F.C. Emley from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Lincoln City F.C. from Jan, 1984 to Jan, 1986.
Neil Redfearn plays for Halifax Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2002.
Neil Redfearn plays for Watford F.C. from Jan, 1989 to Jan, 1990.
|
Neil RedfearnNeil David Redfearn (born 20 June 1965) is an English former professional footballer who played as a midfielder, and is currently head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn played 790 matches in the Football League, the fifth highest total of all-time, and more than a thousand first team games overall in a career that has spanned 24 years. He has had spells as caretaker manager of Halifax Town and York City and as manager of Scarborough, Northwich Victoria and Leeds United.Born in Dewsbury, West Riding of Yorkshire, Redfearn began his career at Bolton Wanderers on 23 June 1982, having previously been on the books of Nottingham Forest's youth team. He later made his name as goalscoring midfielder at lower-division sides Lincoln City and Doncaster Rovers. In May 1985 he was to witness a nightmare when 56 spectators were killed in a horrendous stand fire while playing for Lincoln against Bradford City. In 1987, he was signed by Crystal Palace for £100,000, and he later played for Watford, before moving again in 1989 to Oldham Athletic.Redfearn's last season with Oldham constituted a career highlight as he was an ever-present in the team that won the Second Division title and returned the Latics to the top-flight of English football after a gap of 68 years. Redfearn converted the injury time penalty kick in the final game of the season against Sheffield Wednesday that completed a 3–2 victory (after Oldham had trailed 2–0), and snatched the championship from West Ham United, who had prematurely been handed the trophy some 15 minutes earlier. Despite his contribution to Oldham's promotion, he became surplus to requirements with the re-signing of former club captain Mike Milligan from Everton in the off-season and Redfearn was transferred without playing for Oldham in the top flight.In September 1991, Redfearn joined Barnsley, and it was at this club he arguably spent his prime years. In his seven seasons at Oakwell, he rarely missed a single game, and was named club captain and penalty taker. In the 1996–97 season, Redfearn scored 17 goals as Barnsley won promotion to the FA Premier League for the first time in the club's history. Redfearn missed only one game, and was Barnsley's top scorer with ten league goals in the 1997–98 season. These included Barnsley's first ever top division goal on the opening day of the season, when he put them ahead in the ninth minute at home to West Ham United, although they ended up losing the game 2–1.It was not enough to save them though, as Barnsley were relegated that season. However, despite being in his thirties, Redfearn's performances had made him a wanted man in the Premier League, and he was signed by Charlton Athletic for £1 million in the summer of 1998. He left Barnsley having played 338 first team games, scoring 84 goals.In the 1998–99 season, his family did not settle in London, and at the end of the season, Redfearn jumped at the chance of returning to his native Yorkshire, when Bradford City paid £250,000 for his services. Redfearn did not make much impact at Bradford, scoring just once against Leicester City, and joined his 10th team, Wigan Athletic after just nine months in Bradford. Despite a very good goalscoring record, Redfearn never became first-choice at Wigan either, and he dropped down two divisions to join Halifax Town in 2001.At Halifax, he also got his first taste of management, being appointed caretaker manager alongside Tony Parks following the resignation of Paul Bracewell on 30 August 2001. His spell as caretaker manager came to an end on 12 October following the appointment of Alan Little. Redfearn started a second spell in caretaker charge on 4 March 2002 due to the enforced absence of Little. However, his contract with the club was terminated on 25 April and having been snubbed for the permanent manager's job he joined Boston United as player-coach.Redfearn spent the better part of two years at Boston, before finishing his Football League career at Rochdale in the spring of 2004. Rochdale did not offer him a new contract at the end of the season, meaning he finished his Football League career with 790 appearances and so being fifth in the all-time list of most Football League appearances. His last league appearance for Rochdale took his total to . after which Redfearn dropped down to the Conference, where he became player-coach at Scarborough, managed at the time by his former Oldham teammate Nick Henry. He signed a new contract with Scarborough in April 2005. When Henry was dismissed on 24 October 2005 Redfearn was named caretaker manager, before being appointed permanently on 1 November while remaining registered as a player. Redfearn resigned on 6 July 2006 after Mark Patterson was brought in as assistant manager. He subsequently signed with Northern Premier League First Division side Bradford Park Avenue later that month. He made his 1,000th competitive appearance on 4 November 2006, when Bradford Park Avenue faced Solihull Borough in the second qualifying round of the FA Trophy.Redfearn quit Bradford Park Avenue in March 2007, joining Northern Premier League First Division rivals Stocksbridge Park Steels, but left on 19 June to become manager of Conference Premier side Northwich Victoria. He resigned on 17 September 2007, after the club only managed one point from their first nine games, leaving them bottom of the Conference Premier.He joined Northern Premier League Premier Division club Frickley Athletic as a player in September 2007. He left the club over a month later to join Bridlington Town on 5 November. He left them in January 2008 after the departure of manager Ash Berry. He was appointed as York City's youth team coach in February. He joined Emley in July, where he would play when his commitments with York's youth team allowed. Redfearn moved onto Salford City of the Northern Premier League Division One North in October 2008. He took over as caretaker manager at York on 21 November 2008, following Colin Walker's dismissal, and was in charge for the team's 2–2 draw against Crawley Town. Following Martin Foyle's appointment as manager on 24 November, Redfearn took up the position of assistant manager at the club.Redfearn left York over a month later after being appointed coach of the under-18 academy team at Leeds United on 30 December 2008 and he assumed this role on 1 January 2009. He took over as manager of the Leeds reserve team in December 2010 following the dismissal of Neil Thompson. He was appointed caretaker manager at Leeds following the dismissal of manager Simon Grayson on 1 February 2012. Three days later he won his first match in charge by beating Bristol City 3–0. It was later confirmed by club chairman Ken Bates that Redfearn would retain the managerial post for the following three games. After two wins and two defeats in his four-game spell as manager, Redfearn was replaced as manager by Neil Warnock as permanent manager on 18 February 2012. In April 2012, Redfearn guided Leeds' Under 18's side to a second-place finish in the Under-18s League, narrowly missing out on top spot to Newcastle's Under-18s team.Following the departure of Neil Warnock on 1 April 2013, Redfearn again took charge of the first team for the game at for the 2–1 away defeat against Charlton Athletic on 6 April. In April 2013 manager Brian McDermott announced that Redfearn would become the new First Team Coach as well as combining his role as Reserve Team/Development Squad manager. When McDermott left in May 2014 Redfearn stood down from his role of first team coach to continue his role as reserve team/development squad manager as well as his role of Academy Manager.Redfearn's spell as the Head of Academy was heavily praised due to the influx of Leeds academy players breaking through into the first team such as Dominic Poleon, Chris Dawson, Sam Byram, Alex Mowatt, Lewis Cook and Kalvin Phillips.On 28 August 2014, Redfearn was appointed caretaker head coach after head coach Dave Hockaday and his assistant Junior Lewis were dismissed by owner Massimo Cellino, having been in the job for only 70 days. This was the third time Redfearn had been appointed as a caretaker manager/head coach of Leeds. Redfearn picked up a victory in his first game back in charge with a 1–0 win on 30 August against Bolton Wanderers. On 20 September, Redfearn's Leeds picked up a 3–0 win over local rivals Huddersfield Town. After recording a record of three wins and one draw in his latest stint as caretaker, Leeds announced that Redfearn would be stepping back down into a role described as "Academy manager and head of coaching." with Darko Milanič appointed the new head coach of Leeds on a two-year deal replacing previous head coach Dave Hockaday, he was joined at Leeds by his SK Sturm Graz Assistant Novica Nikčević.On 25 October 2014, Milanič was dismissed by the club after only 32 days in charge. Cellino confirmed that Redfearn would be appointed as Leeds' new head coach. On 27 October 2014 Redfearn confirmed that he verbally agreed to become head coach of Leeds after receiving reassurances that if it does not work out, he will revert to his previous job back in the academy. On 1 November 2014, Redfearn was confirmed as the club's new head coach, on an initial 12-month contract with the option of a further 12 months, the contract also had a clause that would see Redfearn return to the academy if he was to leave his role as head coach. On 18 December 2014, Steve Thompson was hired as Redfearn's new assistant manager.After a change in formation, with Redfearn playing a 4–2–3–1 formation, 2015 saw Leeds pick up an upturn in form, helping Leeds climb from towards the relegation zone positions to a midtable position.On 2 April 2015, Redfearn's assistant Steve Thompson was suspended by Leeds for an 'internal matter' by Leeds Sporting Director Nicola Salerno, with Redfearn advising he was kept in the dark as to the reason's why Thompson had been suspended.Also on 2 April 2015, a story emerged that Redfearn had been put under pressure to 'not select' top scorer Mirco Antenucci, because Antenucci's contract featured a clause of an extra year on his contract, should he score 12 goals in his first season. Antenucci's agent Silvio Pagliari confirmed the clause was correct. Despite this, Redfearn started Antenucci, with Antenucci making a relatively rare start against Wolverhampton Wanderers on 6 April in a 4–3 defeat. On 24 June 2015, former Sporting Director Nicola Salerno proclaimed the decision to not play Antenucci prior was Redfearn's decision.On 9 April, after rumoured Premier League interest in Alex Mowatt and teammates Lewis Cook, Charlie Taylor and Sam Byram, Redfearn challenged Leeds United's owners to keep a hold of their home grown talents.On 18 April 2015, 6 of Owner Massimo Cellino's signings (Mirco Antenucci, Giuseppe Bellusci, Souleymane Doukara, Dario Del Fabro, Marco Silvestri and Edgar Cani) controversially pulled out of the squad with an 'injury' the day before a 2–1 loss against Charlton Athletic.On 14 May 2015, Owner Massimo Cellino carried out a press conference unveiling Adam Pearson as the club's Executive Director to work directly alongside Cellino. The press conference included Cellino leaving halfway through for a cigarette break only to return, and for the press conference to run for over an hour, with Cellino refusing to reveal the future of Redfearn.However, on 16 May, with speculation mounting further about his future as Leeds United Head Coach, Cellino in an interview with The Sunday Mirror proclaimed Redfearn to be 'weak' and 'a baby'.On 20 May 2015, Leeds announced Uwe Rösler as the new head coach, thus ending Redfearn's reign at the club, with no announcement made of Redfearn's departure as head coach, Leeds Executive Director Adam Pearson revealed in the Rosler press conference that Redfearn had been offered back his previous role as Academy Director.On 10 June 2015, Redfearn had accepted to return to his role at the academy. On 16 July 2015, Redfearn resigned as academy director.On 9 October 2015, Redfearn was appointed manager of Championship club Rotherham United on a two-and-a-half-year deal. He was dismissed as manager on 8 February 2016, with Rotherham 22nd in the table.On 29 December 2017, Doncaster Rovers Belles announced the appointment of Redfearn as their new manager. On 13 May 2018, the Belles won the FA WSL 2 title, their first trophy since 1994.On 12 June 2018, he was appointed as the new manager of Liverpool Women (then Liverpool Ladies). His first and ultimately only match in charge ended in a sobering 5–0 loss to Arsenal Women. He resigned on 14 September 2018 after just one game in charge.On 2 October 2018, Redfearn was appointed as the new assistant coach of Ben Dawson at Newcastle United U23.On 21 June 2019, Redfearn was promoted to the role of Newcastle United U23 head coach.On 4 July 2019, Redfearn was announced as the caretaker head coach, assisted by Ben Dawson after the departure of manager Rafael Benítez on 30 June. He took charge of first team training for the 2019/20 pre-season. On 5 November 2019, Redfearn stepped down from this position.On 28 August 2020, Redfearn was announced as the new head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn's father, Brian, is a former professional footballer. He is a lifelong Leeds fan. Redfearn married Susan Roberts in Dewsbury in 1985.Oldham AthleticDoncaster Rovers Belles
|
[
"Bradford City A.F.C.",
"Doncaster Rovers F.C.",
"Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C.",
"Salford City F.C.",
"Bolton Wanderers F.C.",
"Frickley Athletic F.C.",
"Barnsley F.C.",
"Scarborough F.C.",
"Boston United F.C.",
"A.F.C. Emley",
"Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C.",
"Crystal Palace F.C.",
"Rochdale A.F.C.",
"Charlton Athletic F.C.",
"Lincoln City F.C.",
"Halifax Town A.F.C.",
"Oldham Athletic A.F.C.",
"Bridlington Town A.F.C.",
"Wigan Athletic F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Neil Redfearn play for in 12/10/1989?
|
October 12, 1989
|
{
"text": [
"Watford F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q6065586_P54_4
|
Neil Redfearn plays for Charlton Athletic F.C. from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 1999.
Neil Redfearn plays for Frickley Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Barnsley F.C. from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1998.
Neil Redfearn plays for Boston United F.C. from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Rochdale A.F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C. from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Salford City F.C. from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bridlington Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Scarborough F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2006.
Neil Redfearn plays for Doncaster Rovers F.C. from Jan, 1986 to Jan, 1987.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford City A.F.C. from Jan, 1999 to Jan, 2000.
Neil Redfearn plays for Crystal Palace F.C. from Jan, 1987 to Jan, 1989.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bolton Wanderers F.C. from Jan, 1982 to Jan, 1984.
Neil Redfearn plays for Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Oldham Athletic A.F.C. from Jan, 1990 to Jan, 1991.
Neil Redfearn plays for Wigan Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2001.
Neil Redfearn plays for A.F.C. Emley from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Lincoln City F.C. from Jan, 1984 to Jan, 1986.
Neil Redfearn plays for Halifax Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2002.
Neil Redfearn plays for Watford F.C. from Jan, 1989 to Jan, 1990.
|
Neil RedfearnNeil David Redfearn (born 20 June 1965) is an English former professional footballer who played as a midfielder, and is currently head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn played 790 matches in the Football League, the fifth highest total of all-time, and more than a thousand first team games overall in a career that has spanned 24 years. He has had spells as caretaker manager of Halifax Town and York City and as manager of Scarborough, Northwich Victoria and Leeds United.Born in Dewsbury, West Riding of Yorkshire, Redfearn began his career at Bolton Wanderers on 23 June 1982, having previously been on the books of Nottingham Forest's youth team. He later made his name as goalscoring midfielder at lower-division sides Lincoln City and Doncaster Rovers. In May 1985 he was to witness a nightmare when 56 spectators were killed in a horrendous stand fire while playing for Lincoln against Bradford City. In 1987, he was signed by Crystal Palace for £100,000, and he later played for Watford, before moving again in 1989 to Oldham Athletic.Redfearn's last season with Oldham constituted a career highlight as he was an ever-present in the team that won the Second Division title and returned the Latics to the top-flight of English football after a gap of 68 years. Redfearn converted the injury time penalty kick in the final game of the season against Sheffield Wednesday that completed a 3–2 victory (after Oldham had trailed 2–0), and snatched the championship from West Ham United, who had prematurely been handed the trophy some 15 minutes earlier. Despite his contribution to Oldham's promotion, he became surplus to requirements with the re-signing of former club captain Mike Milligan from Everton in the off-season and Redfearn was transferred without playing for Oldham in the top flight.In September 1991, Redfearn joined Barnsley, and it was at this club he arguably spent his prime years. In his seven seasons at Oakwell, he rarely missed a single game, and was named club captain and penalty taker. In the 1996–97 season, Redfearn scored 17 goals as Barnsley won promotion to the FA Premier League for the first time in the club's history. Redfearn missed only one game, and was Barnsley's top scorer with ten league goals in the 1997–98 season. These included Barnsley's first ever top division goal on the opening day of the season, when he put them ahead in the ninth minute at home to West Ham United, although they ended up losing the game 2–1.It was not enough to save them though, as Barnsley were relegated that season. However, despite being in his thirties, Redfearn's performances had made him a wanted man in the Premier League, and he was signed by Charlton Athletic for £1 million in the summer of 1998. He left Barnsley having played 338 first team games, scoring 84 goals.In the 1998–99 season, his family did not settle in London, and at the end of the season, Redfearn jumped at the chance of returning to his native Yorkshire, when Bradford City paid £250,000 for his services. Redfearn did not make much impact at Bradford, scoring just once against Leicester City, and joined his 10th team, Wigan Athletic after just nine months in Bradford. Despite a very good goalscoring record, Redfearn never became first-choice at Wigan either, and he dropped down two divisions to join Halifax Town in 2001.At Halifax, he also got his first taste of management, being appointed caretaker manager alongside Tony Parks following the resignation of Paul Bracewell on 30 August 2001. His spell as caretaker manager came to an end on 12 October following the appointment of Alan Little. Redfearn started a second spell in caretaker charge on 4 March 2002 due to the enforced absence of Little. However, his contract with the club was terminated on 25 April and having been snubbed for the permanent manager's job he joined Boston United as player-coach.Redfearn spent the better part of two years at Boston, before finishing his Football League career at Rochdale in the spring of 2004. Rochdale did not offer him a new contract at the end of the season, meaning he finished his Football League career with 790 appearances and so being fifth in the all-time list of most Football League appearances. His last league appearance for Rochdale took his total to . after which Redfearn dropped down to the Conference, where he became player-coach at Scarborough, managed at the time by his former Oldham teammate Nick Henry. He signed a new contract with Scarborough in April 2005. When Henry was dismissed on 24 October 2005 Redfearn was named caretaker manager, before being appointed permanently on 1 November while remaining registered as a player. Redfearn resigned on 6 July 2006 after Mark Patterson was brought in as assistant manager. He subsequently signed with Northern Premier League First Division side Bradford Park Avenue later that month. He made his 1,000th competitive appearance on 4 November 2006, when Bradford Park Avenue faced Solihull Borough in the second qualifying round of the FA Trophy.Redfearn quit Bradford Park Avenue in March 2007, joining Northern Premier League First Division rivals Stocksbridge Park Steels, but left on 19 June to become manager of Conference Premier side Northwich Victoria. He resigned on 17 September 2007, after the club only managed one point from their first nine games, leaving them bottom of the Conference Premier.He joined Northern Premier League Premier Division club Frickley Athletic as a player in September 2007. He left the club over a month later to join Bridlington Town on 5 November. He left them in January 2008 after the departure of manager Ash Berry. He was appointed as York City's youth team coach in February. He joined Emley in July, where he would play when his commitments with York's youth team allowed. Redfearn moved onto Salford City of the Northern Premier League Division One North in October 2008. He took over as caretaker manager at York on 21 November 2008, following Colin Walker's dismissal, and was in charge for the team's 2–2 draw against Crawley Town. Following Martin Foyle's appointment as manager on 24 November, Redfearn took up the position of assistant manager at the club.Redfearn left York over a month later after being appointed coach of the under-18 academy team at Leeds United on 30 December 2008 and he assumed this role on 1 January 2009. He took over as manager of the Leeds reserve team in December 2010 following the dismissal of Neil Thompson. He was appointed caretaker manager at Leeds following the dismissal of manager Simon Grayson on 1 February 2012. Three days later he won his first match in charge by beating Bristol City 3–0. It was later confirmed by club chairman Ken Bates that Redfearn would retain the managerial post for the following three games. After two wins and two defeats in his four-game spell as manager, Redfearn was replaced as manager by Neil Warnock as permanent manager on 18 February 2012. In April 2012, Redfearn guided Leeds' Under 18's side to a second-place finish in the Under-18s League, narrowly missing out on top spot to Newcastle's Under-18s team.Following the departure of Neil Warnock on 1 April 2013, Redfearn again took charge of the first team for the game at for the 2–1 away defeat against Charlton Athletic on 6 April. In April 2013 manager Brian McDermott announced that Redfearn would become the new First Team Coach as well as combining his role as Reserve Team/Development Squad manager. When McDermott left in May 2014 Redfearn stood down from his role of first team coach to continue his role as reserve team/development squad manager as well as his role of Academy Manager.Redfearn's spell as the Head of Academy was heavily praised due to the influx of Leeds academy players breaking through into the first team such as Dominic Poleon, Chris Dawson, Sam Byram, Alex Mowatt, Lewis Cook and Kalvin Phillips.On 28 August 2014, Redfearn was appointed caretaker head coach after head coach Dave Hockaday and his assistant Junior Lewis were dismissed by owner Massimo Cellino, having been in the job for only 70 days. This was the third time Redfearn had been appointed as a caretaker manager/head coach of Leeds. Redfearn picked up a victory in his first game back in charge with a 1–0 win on 30 August against Bolton Wanderers. On 20 September, Redfearn's Leeds picked up a 3–0 win over local rivals Huddersfield Town. After recording a record of three wins and one draw in his latest stint as caretaker, Leeds announced that Redfearn would be stepping back down into a role described as "Academy manager and head of coaching." with Darko Milanič appointed the new head coach of Leeds on a two-year deal replacing previous head coach Dave Hockaday, he was joined at Leeds by his SK Sturm Graz Assistant Novica Nikčević.On 25 October 2014, Milanič was dismissed by the club after only 32 days in charge. Cellino confirmed that Redfearn would be appointed as Leeds' new head coach. On 27 October 2014 Redfearn confirmed that he verbally agreed to become head coach of Leeds after receiving reassurances that if it does not work out, he will revert to his previous job back in the academy. On 1 November 2014, Redfearn was confirmed as the club's new head coach, on an initial 12-month contract with the option of a further 12 months, the contract also had a clause that would see Redfearn return to the academy if he was to leave his role as head coach. On 18 December 2014, Steve Thompson was hired as Redfearn's new assistant manager.After a change in formation, with Redfearn playing a 4–2–3–1 formation, 2015 saw Leeds pick up an upturn in form, helping Leeds climb from towards the relegation zone positions to a midtable position.On 2 April 2015, Redfearn's assistant Steve Thompson was suspended by Leeds for an 'internal matter' by Leeds Sporting Director Nicola Salerno, with Redfearn advising he was kept in the dark as to the reason's why Thompson had been suspended.Also on 2 April 2015, a story emerged that Redfearn had been put under pressure to 'not select' top scorer Mirco Antenucci, because Antenucci's contract featured a clause of an extra year on his contract, should he score 12 goals in his first season. Antenucci's agent Silvio Pagliari confirmed the clause was correct. Despite this, Redfearn started Antenucci, with Antenucci making a relatively rare start against Wolverhampton Wanderers on 6 April in a 4–3 defeat. On 24 June 2015, former Sporting Director Nicola Salerno proclaimed the decision to not play Antenucci prior was Redfearn's decision.On 9 April, after rumoured Premier League interest in Alex Mowatt and teammates Lewis Cook, Charlie Taylor and Sam Byram, Redfearn challenged Leeds United's owners to keep a hold of their home grown talents.On 18 April 2015, 6 of Owner Massimo Cellino's signings (Mirco Antenucci, Giuseppe Bellusci, Souleymane Doukara, Dario Del Fabro, Marco Silvestri and Edgar Cani) controversially pulled out of the squad with an 'injury' the day before a 2–1 loss against Charlton Athletic.On 14 May 2015, Owner Massimo Cellino carried out a press conference unveiling Adam Pearson as the club's Executive Director to work directly alongside Cellino. The press conference included Cellino leaving halfway through for a cigarette break only to return, and for the press conference to run for over an hour, with Cellino refusing to reveal the future of Redfearn.However, on 16 May, with speculation mounting further about his future as Leeds United Head Coach, Cellino in an interview with The Sunday Mirror proclaimed Redfearn to be 'weak' and 'a baby'.On 20 May 2015, Leeds announced Uwe Rösler as the new head coach, thus ending Redfearn's reign at the club, with no announcement made of Redfearn's departure as head coach, Leeds Executive Director Adam Pearson revealed in the Rosler press conference that Redfearn had been offered back his previous role as Academy Director.On 10 June 2015, Redfearn had accepted to return to his role at the academy. On 16 July 2015, Redfearn resigned as academy director.On 9 October 2015, Redfearn was appointed manager of Championship club Rotherham United on a two-and-a-half-year deal. He was dismissed as manager on 8 February 2016, with Rotherham 22nd in the table.On 29 December 2017, Doncaster Rovers Belles announced the appointment of Redfearn as their new manager. On 13 May 2018, the Belles won the FA WSL 2 title, their first trophy since 1994.On 12 June 2018, he was appointed as the new manager of Liverpool Women (then Liverpool Ladies). His first and ultimately only match in charge ended in a sobering 5–0 loss to Arsenal Women. He resigned on 14 September 2018 after just one game in charge.On 2 October 2018, Redfearn was appointed as the new assistant coach of Ben Dawson at Newcastle United U23.On 21 June 2019, Redfearn was promoted to the role of Newcastle United U23 head coach.On 4 July 2019, Redfearn was announced as the caretaker head coach, assisted by Ben Dawson after the departure of manager Rafael Benítez on 30 June. He took charge of first team training for the 2019/20 pre-season. On 5 November 2019, Redfearn stepped down from this position.On 28 August 2020, Redfearn was announced as the new head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn's father, Brian, is a former professional footballer. He is a lifelong Leeds fan. Redfearn married Susan Roberts in Dewsbury in 1985.Oldham AthleticDoncaster Rovers Belles
|
[
"Bradford City A.F.C.",
"Doncaster Rovers F.C.",
"Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C.",
"Salford City F.C.",
"Bolton Wanderers F.C.",
"Frickley Athletic F.C.",
"Barnsley F.C.",
"Scarborough F.C.",
"Boston United F.C.",
"A.F.C. Emley",
"Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C.",
"Crystal Palace F.C.",
"Rochdale A.F.C.",
"Charlton Athletic F.C.",
"Lincoln City F.C.",
"Halifax Town A.F.C.",
"Oldham Athletic A.F.C.",
"Bridlington Town A.F.C.",
"Wigan Athletic F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Neil Redfearn play for in Oct 12, 1989?
|
October 12, 1989
|
{
"text": [
"Watford F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q6065586_P54_4
|
Neil Redfearn plays for Charlton Athletic F.C. from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 1999.
Neil Redfearn plays for Frickley Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Barnsley F.C. from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1998.
Neil Redfearn plays for Boston United F.C. from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Rochdale A.F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C. from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Salford City F.C. from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bridlington Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Scarborough F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2006.
Neil Redfearn plays for Doncaster Rovers F.C. from Jan, 1986 to Jan, 1987.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford City A.F.C. from Jan, 1999 to Jan, 2000.
Neil Redfearn plays for Crystal Palace F.C. from Jan, 1987 to Jan, 1989.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bolton Wanderers F.C. from Jan, 1982 to Jan, 1984.
Neil Redfearn plays for Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Oldham Athletic A.F.C. from Jan, 1990 to Jan, 1991.
Neil Redfearn plays for Wigan Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2001.
Neil Redfearn plays for A.F.C. Emley from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Lincoln City F.C. from Jan, 1984 to Jan, 1986.
Neil Redfearn plays for Halifax Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2002.
Neil Redfearn plays for Watford F.C. from Jan, 1989 to Jan, 1990.
|
Neil RedfearnNeil David Redfearn (born 20 June 1965) is an English former professional footballer who played as a midfielder, and is currently head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn played 790 matches in the Football League, the fifth highest total of all-time, and more than a thousand first team games overall in a career that has spanned 24 years. He has had spells as caretaker manager of Halifax Town and York City and as manager of Scarborough, Northwich Victoria and Leeds United.Born in Dewsbury, West Riding of Yorkshire, Redfearn began his career at Bolton Wanderers on 23 June 1982, having previously been on the books of Nottingham Forest's youth team. He later made his name as goalscoring midfielder at lower-division sides Lincoln City and Doncaster Rovers. In May 1985 he was to witness a nightmare when 56 spectators were killed in a horrendous stand fire while playing for Lincoln against Bradford City. In 1987, he was signed by Crystal Palace for £100,000, and he later played for Watford, before moving again in 1989 to Oldham Athletic.Redfearn's last season with Oldham constituted a career highlight as he was an ever-present in the team that won the Second Division title and returned the Latics to the top-flight of English football after a gap of 68 years. Redfearn converted the injury time penalty kick in the final game of the season against Sheffield Wednesday that completed a 3–2 victory (after Oldham had trailed 2–0), and snatched the championship from West Ham United, who had prematurely been handed the trophy some 15 minutes earlier. Despite his contribution to Oldham's promotion, he became surplus to requirements with the re-signing of former club captain Mike Milligan from Everton in the off-season and Redfearn was transferred without playing for Oldham in the top flight.In September 1991, Redfearn joined Barnsley, and it was at this club he arguably spent his prime years. In his seven seasons at Oakwell, he rarely missed a single game, and was named club captain and penalty taker. In the 1996–97 season, Redfearn scored 17 goals as Barnsley won promotion to the FA Premier League for the first time in the club's history. Redfearn missed only one game, and was Barnsley's top scorer with ten league goals in the 1997–98 season. These included Barnsley's first ever top division goal on the opening day of the season, when he put them ahead in the ninth minute at home to West Ham United, although they ended up losing the game 2–1.It was not enough to save them though, as Barnsley were relegated that season. However, despite being in his thirties, Redfearn's performances had made him a wanted man in the Premier League, and he was signed by Charlton Athletic for £1 million in the summer of 1998. He left Barnsley having played 338 first team games, scoring 84 goals.In the 1998–99 season, his family did not settle in London, and at the end of the season, Redfearn jumped at the chance of returning to his native Yorkshire, when Bradford City paid £250,000 for his services. Redfearn did not make much impact at Bradford, scoring just once against Leicester City, and joined his 10th team, Wigan Athletic after just nine months in Bradford. Despite a very good goalscoring record, Redfearn never became first-choice at Wigan either, and he dropped down two divisions to join Halifax Town in 2001.At Halifax, he also got his first taste of management, being appointed caretaker manager alongside Tony Parks following the resignation of Paul Bracewell on 30 August 2001. His spell as caretaker manager came to an end on 12 October following the appointment of Alan Little. Redfearn started a second spell in caretaker charge on 4 March 2002 due to the enforced absence of Little. However, his contract with the club was terminated on 25 April and having been snubbed for the permanent manager's job he joined Boston United as player-coach.Redfearn spent the better part of two years at Boston, before finishing his Football League career at Rochdale in the spring of 2004. Rochdale did not offer him a new contract at the end of the season, meaning he finished his Football League career with 790 appearances and so being fifth in the all-time list of most Football League appearances. His last league appearance for Rochdale took his total to . after which Redfearn dropped down to the Conference, where he became player-coach at Scarborough, managed at the time by his former Oldham teammate Nick Henry. He signed a new contract with Scarborough in April 2005. When Henry was dismissed on 24 October 2005 Redfearn was named caretaker manager, before being appointed permanently on 1 November while remaining registered as a player. Redfearn resigned on 6 July 2006 after Mark Patterson was brought in as assistant manager. He subsequently signed with Northern Premier League First Division side Bradford Park Avenue later that month. He made his 1,000th competitive appearance on 4 November 2006, when Bradford Park Avenue faced Solihull Borough in the second qualifying round of the FA Trophy.Redfearn quit Bradford Park Avenue in March 2007, joining Northern Premier League First Division rivals Stocksbridge Park Steels, but left on 19 June to become manager of Conference Premier side Northwich Victoria. He resigned on 17 September 2007, after the club only managed one point from their first nine games, leaving them bottom of the Conference Premier.He joined Northern Premier League Premier Division club Frickley Athletic as a player in September 2007. He left the club over a month later to join Bridlington Town on 5 November. He left them in January 2008 after the departure of manager Ash Berry. He was appointed as York City's youth team coach in February. He joined Emley in July, where he would play when his commitments with York's youth team allowed. Redfearn moved onto Salford City of the Northern Premier League Division One North in October 2008. He took over as caretaker manager at York on 21 November 2008, following Colin Walker's dismissal, and was in charge for the team's 2–2 draw against Crawley Town. Following Martin Foyle's appointment as manager on 24 November, Redfearn took up the position of assistant manager at the club.Redfearn left York over a month later after being appointed coach of the under-18 academy team at Leeds United on 30 December 2008 and he assumed this role on 1 January 2009. He took over as manager of the Leeds reserve team in December 2010 following the dismissal of Neil Thompson. He was appointed caretaker manager at Leeds following the dismissal of manager Simon Grayson on 1 February 2012. Three days later he won his first match in charge by beating Bristol City 3–0. It was later confirmed by club chairman Ken Bates that Redfearn would retain the managerial post for the following three games. After two wins and two defeats in his four-game spell as manager, Redfearn was replaced as manager by Neil Warnock as permanent manager on 18 February 2012. In April 2012, Redfearn guided Leeds' Under 18's side to a second-place finish in the Under-18s League, narrowly missing out on top spot to Newcastle's Under-18s team.Following the departure of Neil Warnock on 1 April 2013, Redfearn again took charge of the first team for the game at for the 2–1 away defeat against Charlton Athletic on 6 April. In April 2013 manager Brian McDermott announced that Redfearn would become the new First Team Coach as well as combining his role as Reserve Team/Development Squad manager. When McDermott left in May 2014 Redfearn stood down from his role of first team coach to continue his role as reserve team/development squad manager as well as his role of Academy Manager.Redfearn's spell as the Head of Academy was heavily praised due to the influx of Leeds academy players breaking through into the first team such as Dominic Poleon, Chris Dawson, Sam Byram, Alex Mowatt, Lewis Cook and Kalvin Phillips.On 28 August 2014, Redfearn was appointed caretaker head coach after head coach Dave Hockaday and his assistant Junior Lewis were dismissed by owner Massimo Cellino, having been in the job for only 70 days. This was the third time Redfearn had been appointed as a caretaker manager/head coach of Leeds. Redfearn picked up a victory in his first game back in charge with a 1–0 win on 30 August against Bolton Wanderers. On 20 September, Redfearn's Leeds picked up a 3–0 win over local rivals Huddersfield Town. After recording a record of three wins and one draw in his latest stint as caretaker, Leeds announced that Redfearn would be stepping back down into a role described as "Academy manager and head of coaching." with Darko Milanič appointed the new head coach of Leeds on a two-year deal replacing previous head coach Dave Hockaday, he was joined at Leeds by his SK Sturm Graz Assistant Novica Nikčević.On 25 October 2014, Milanič was dismissed by the club after only 32 days in charge. Cellino confirmed that Redfearn would be appointed as Leeds' new head coach. On 27 October 2014 Redfearn confirmed that he verbally agreed to become head coach of Leeds after receiving reassurances that if it does not work out, he will revert to his previous job back in the academy. On 1 November 2014, Redfearn was confirmed as the club's new head coach, on an initial 12-month contract with the option of a further 12 months, the contract also had a clause that would see Redfearn return to the academy if he was to leave his role as head coach. On 18 December 2014, Steve Thompson was hired as Redfearn's new assistant manager.After a change in formation, with Redfearn playing a 4–2–3–1 formation, 2015 saw Leeds pick up an upturn in form, helping Leeds climb from towards the relegation zone positions to a midtable position.On 2 April 2015, Redfearn's assistant Steve Thompson was suspended by Leeds for an 'internal matter' by Leeds Sporting Director Nicola Salerno, with Redfearn advising he was kept in the dark as to the reason's why Thompson had been suspended.Also on 2 April 2015, a story emerged that Redfearn had been put under pressure to 'not select' top scorer Mirco Antenucci, because Antenucci's contract featured a clause of an extra year on his contract, should he score 12 goals in his first season. Antenucci's agent Silvio Pagliari confirmed the clause was correct. Despite this, Redfearn started Antenucci, with Antenucci making a relatively rare start against Wolverhampton Wanderers on 6 April in a 4–3 defeat. On 24 June 2015, former Sporting Director Nicola Salerno proclaimed the decision to not play Antenucci prior was Redfearn's decision.On 9 April, after rumoured Premier League interest in Alex Mowatt and teammates Lewis Cook, Charlie Taylor and Sam Byram, Redfearn challenged Leeds United's owners to keep a hold of their home grown talents.On 18 April 2015, 6 of Owner Massimo Cellino's signings (Mirco Antenucci, Giuseppe Bellusci, Souleymane Doukara, Dario Del Fabro, Marco Silvestri and Edgar Cani) controversially pulled out of the squad with an 'injury' the day before a 2–1 loss against Charlton Athletic.On 14 May 2015, Owner Massimo Cellino carried out a press conference unveiling Adam Pearson as the club's Executive Director to work directly alongside Cellino. The press conference included Cellino leaving halfway through for a cigarette break only to return, and for the press conference to run for over an hour, with Cellino refusing to reveal the future of Redfearn.However, on 16 May, with speculation mounting further about his future as Leeds United Head Coach, Cellino in an interview with The Sunday Mirror proclaimed Redfearn to be 'weak' and 'a baby'.On 20 May 2015, Leeds announced Uwe Rösler as the new head coach, thus ending Redfearn's reign at the club, with no announcement made of Redfearn's departure as head coach, Leeds Executive Director Adam Pearson revealed in the Rosler press conference that Redfearn had been offered back his previous role as Academy Director.On 10 June 2015, Redfearn had accepted to return to his role at the academy. On 16 July 2015, Redfearn resigned as academy director.On 9 October 2015, Redfearn was appointed manager of Championship club Rotherham United on a two-and-a-half-year deal. He was dismissed as manager on 8 February 2016, with Rotherham 22nd in the table.On 29 December 2017, Doncaster Rovers Belles announced the appointment of Redfearn as their new manager. On 13 May 2018, the Belles won the FA WSL 2 title, their first trophy since 1994.On 12 June 2018, he was appointed as the new manager of Liverpool Women (then Liverpool Ladies). His first and ultimately only match in charge ended in a sobering 5–0 loss to Arsenal Women. He resigned on 14 September 2018 after just one game in charge.On 2 October 2018, Redfearn was appointed as the new assistant coach of Ben Dawson at Newcastle United U23.On 21 June 2019, Redfearn was promoted to the role of Newcastle United U23 head coach.On 4 July 2019, Redfearn was announced as the caretaker head coach, assisted by Ben Dawson after the departure of manager Rafael Benítez on 30 June. He took charge of first team training for the 2019/20 pre-season. On 5 November 2019, Redfearn stepped down from this position.On 28 August 2020, Redfearn was announced as the new head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn's father, Brian, is a former professional footballer. He is a lifelong Leeds fan. Redfearn married Susan Roberts in Dewsbury in 1985.Oldham AthleticDoncaster Rovers Belles
|
[
"Bradford City A.F.C.",
"Doncaster Rovers F.C.",
"Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C.",
"Salford City F.C.",
"Bolton Wanderers F.C.",
"Frickley Athletic F.C.",
"Barnsley F.C.",
"Scarborough F.C.",
"Boston United F.C.",
"A.F.C. Emley",
"Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C.",
"Crystal Palace F.C.",
"Rochdale A.F.C.",
"Charlton Athletic F.C.",
"Lincoln City F.C.",
"Halifax Town A.F.C.",
"Oldham Athletic A.F.C.",
"Bridlington Town A.F.C.",
"Wigan Athletic F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Neil Redfearn play for in 10/12/1989?
|
October 12, 1989
|
{
"text": [
"Watford F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q6065586_P54_4
|
Neil Redfearn plays for Charlton Athletic F.C. from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 1999.
Neil Redfearn plays for Frickley Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Barnsley F.C. from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1998.
Neil Redfearn plays for Boston United F.C. from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Rochdale A.F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C. from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Salford City F.C. from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bridlington Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Scarborough F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2006.
Neil Redfearn plays for Doncaster Rovers F.C. from Jan, 1986 to Jan, 1987.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford City A.F.C. from Jan, 1999 to Jan, 2000.
Neil Redfearn plays for Crystal Palace F.C. from Jan, 1987 to Jan, 1989.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bolton Wanderers F.C. from Jan, 1982 to Jan, 1984.
Neil Redfearn plays for Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Oldham Athletic A.F.C. from Jan, 1990 to Jan, 1991.
Neil Redfearn plays for Wigan Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2001.
Neil Redfearn plays for A.F.C. Emley from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Lincoln City F.C. from Jan, 1984 to Jan, 1986.
Neil Redfearn plays for Halifax Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2002.
Neil Redfearn plays for Watford F.C. from Jan, 1989 to Jan, 1990.
|
Neil RedfearnNeil David Redfearn (born 20 June 1965) is an English former professional footballer who played as a midfielder, and is currently head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn played 790 matches in the Football League, the fifth highest total of all-time, and more than a thousand first team games overall in a career that has spanned 24 years. He has had spells as caretaker manager of Halifax Town and York City and as manager of Scarborough, Northwich Victoria and Leeds United.Born in Dewsbury, West Riding of Yorkshire, Redfearn began his career at Bolton Wanderers on 23 June 1982, having previously been on the books of Nottingham Forest's youth team. He later made his name as goalscoring midfielder at lower-division sides Lincoln City and Doncaster Rovers. In May 1985 he was to witness a nightmare when 56 spectators were killed in a horrendous stand fire while playing for Lincoln against Bradford City. In 1987, he was signed by Crystal Palace for £100,000, and he later played for Watford, before moving again in 1989 to Oldham Athletic.Redfearn's last season with Oldham constituted a career highlight as he was an ever-present in the team that won the Second Division title and returned the Latics to the top-flight of English football after a gap of 68 years. Redfearn converted the injury time penalty kick in the final game of the season against Sheffield Wednesday that completed a 3–2 victory (after Oldham had trailed 2–0), and snatched the championship from West Ham United, who had prematurely been handed the trophy some 15 minutes earlier. Despite his contribution to Oldham's promotion, he became surplus to requirements with the re-signing of former club captain Mike Milligan from Everton in the off-season and Redfearn was transferred without playing for Oldham in the top flight.In September 1991, Redfearn joined Barnsley, and it was at this club he arguably spent his prime years. In his seven seasons at Oakwell, he rarely missed a single game, and was named club captain and penalty taker. In the 1996–97 season, Redfearn scored 17 goals as Barnsley won promotion to the FA Premier League for the first time in the club's history. Redfearn missed only one game, and was Barnsley's top scorer with ten league goals in the 1997–98 season. These included Barnsley's first ever top division goal on the opening day of the season, when he put them ahead in the ninth minute at home to West Ham United, although they ended up losing the game 2–1.It was not enough to save them though, as Barnsley were relegated that season. However, despite being in his thirties, Redfearn's performances had made him a wanted man in the Premier League, and he was signed by Charlton Athletic for £1 million in the summer of 1998. He left Barnsley having played 338 first team games, scoring 84 goals.In the 1998–99 season, his family did not settle in London, and at the end of the season, Redfearn jumped at the chance of returning to his native Yorkshire, when Bradford City paid £250,000 for his services. Redfearn did not make much impact at Bradford, scoring just once against Leicester City, and joined his 10th team, Wigan Athletic after just nine months in Bradford. Despite a very good goalscoring record, Redfearn never became first-choice at Wigan either, and he dropped down two divisions to join Halifax Town in 2001.At Halifax, he also got his first taste of management, being appointed caretaker manager alongside Tony Parks following the resignation of Paul Bracewell on 30 August 2001. His spell as caretaker manager came to an end on 12 October following the appointment of Alan Little. Redfearn started a second spell in caretaker charge on 4 March 2002 due to the enforced absence of Little. However, his contract with the club was terminated on 25 April and having been snubbed for the permanent manager's job he joined Boston United as player-coach.Redfearn spent the better part of two years at Boston, before finishing his Football League career at Rochdale in the spring of 2004. Rochdale did not offer him a new contract at the end of the season, meaning he finished his Football League career with 790 appearances and so being fifth in the all-time list of most Football League appearances. His last league appearance for Rochdale took his total to . after which Redfearn dropped down to the Conference, where he became player-coach at Scarborough, managed at the time by his former Oldham teammate Nick Henry. He signed a new contract with Scarborough in April 2005. When Henry was dismissed on 24 October 2005 Redfearn was named caretaker manager, before being appointed permanently on 1 November while remaining registered as a player. Redfearn resigned on 6 July 2006 after Mark Patterson was brought in as assistant manager. He subsequently signed with Northern Premier League First Division side Bradford Park Avenue later that month. He made his 1,000th competitive appearance on 4 November 2006, when Bradford Park Avenue faced Solihull Borough in the second qualifying round of the FA Trophy.Redfearn quit Bradford Park Avenue in March 2007, joining Northern Premier League First Division rivals Stocksbridge Park Steels, but left on 19 June to become manager of Conference Premier side Northwich Victoria. He resigned on 17 September 2007, after the club only managed one point from their first nine games, leaving them bottom of the Conference Premier.He joined Northern Premier League Premier Division club Frickley Athletic as a player in September 2007. He left the club over a month later to join Bridlington Town on 5 November. He left them in January 2008 after the departure of manager Ash Berry. He was appointed as York City's youth team coach in February. He joined Emley in July, where he would play when his commitments with York's youth team allowed. Redfearn moved onto Salford City of the Northern Premier League Division One North in October 2008. He took over as caretaker manager at York on 21 November 2008, following Colin Walker's dismissal, and was in charge for the team's 2–2 draw against Crawley Town. Following Martin Foyle's appointment as manager on 24 November, Redfearn took up the position of assistant manager at the club.Redfearn left York over a month later after being appointed coach of the under-18 academy team at Leeds United on 30 December 2008 and he assumed this role on 1 January 2009. He took over as manager of the Leeds reserve team in December 2010 following the dismissal of Neil Thompson. He was appointed caretaker manager at Leeds following the dismissal of manager Simon Grayson on 1 February 2012. Three days later he won his first match in charge by beating Bristol City 3–0. It was later confirmed by club chairman Ken Bates that Redfearn would retain the managerial post for the following three games. After two wins and two defeats in his four-game spell as manager, Redfearn was replaced as manager by Neil Warnock as permanent manager on 18 February 2012. In April 2012, Redfearn guided Leeds' Under 18's side to a second-place finish in the Under-18s League, narrowly missing out on top spot to Newcastle's Under-18s team.Following the departure of Neil Warnock on 1 April 2013, Redfearn again took charge of the first team for the game at for the 2–1 away defeat against Charlton Athletic on 6 April. In April 2013 manager Brian McDermott announced that Redfearn would become the new First Team Coach as well as combining his role as Reserve Team/Development Squad manager. When McDermott left in May 2014 Redfearn stood down from his role of first team coach to continue his role as reserve team/development squad manager as well as his role of Academy Manager.Redfearn's spell as the Head of Academy was heavily praised due to the influx of Leeds academy players breaking through into the first team such as Dominic Poleon, Chris Dawson, Sam Byram, Alex Mowatt, Lewis Cook and Kalvin Phillips.On 28 August 2014, Redfearn was appointed caretaker head coach after head coach Dave Hockaday and his assistant Junior Lewis were dismissed by owner Massimo Cellino, having been in the job for only 70 days. This was the third time Redfearn had been appointed as a caretaker manager/head coach of Leeds. Redfearn picked up a victory in his first game back in charge with a 1–0 win on 30 August against Bolton Wanderers. On 20 September, Redfearn's Leeds picked up a 3–0 win over local rivals Huddersfield Town. After recording a record of three wins and one draw in his latest stint as caretaker, Leeds announced that Redfearn would be stepping back down into a role described as "Academy manager and head of coaching." with Darko Milanič appointed the new head coach of Leeds on a two-year deal replacing previous head coach Dave Hockaday, he was joined at Leeds by his SK Sturm Graz Assistant Novica Nikčević.On 25 October 2014, Milanič was dismissed by the club after only 32 days in charge. Cellino confirmed that Redfearn would be appointed as Leeds' new head coach. On 27 October 2014 Redfearn confirmed that he verbally agreed to become head coach of Leeds after receiving reassurances that if it does not work out, he will revert to his previous job back in the academy. On 1 November 2014, Redfearn was confirmed as the club's new head coach, on an initial 12-month contract with the option of a further 12 months, the contract also had a clause that would see Redfearn return to the academy if he was to leave his role as head coach. On 18 December 2014, Steve Thompson was hired as Redfearn's new assistant manager.After a change in formation, with Redfearn playing a 4–2–3–1 formation, 2015 saw Leeds pick up an upturn in form, helping Leeds climb from towards the relegation zone positions to a midtable position.On 2 April 2015, Redfearn's assistant Steve Thompson was suspended by Leeds for an 'internal matter' by Leeds Sporting Director Nicola Salerno, with Redfearn advising he was kept in the dark as to the reason's why Thompson had been suspended.Also on 2 April 2015, a story emerged that Redfearn had been put under pressure to 'not select' top scorer Mirco Antenucci, because Antenucci's contract featured a clause of an extra year on his contract, should he score 12 goals in his first season. Antenucci's agent Silvio Pagliari confirmed the clause was correct. Despite this, Redfearn started Antenucci, with Antenucci making a relatively rare start against Wolverhampton Wanderers on 6 April in a 4–3 defeat. On 24 June 2015, former Sporting Director Nicola Salerno proclaimed the decision to not play Antenucci prior was Redfearn's decision.On 9 April, after rumoured Premier League interest in Alex Mowatt and teammates Lewis Cook, Charlie Taylor and Sam Byram, Redfearn challenged Leeds United's owners to keep a hold of their home grown talents.On 18 April 2015, 6 of Owner Massimo Cellino's signings (Mirco Antenucci, Giuseppe Bellusci, Souleymane Doukara, Dario Del Fabro, Marco Silvestri and Edgar Cani) controversially pulled out of the squad with an 'injury' the day before a 2–1 loss against Charlton Athletic.On 14 May 2015, Owner Massimo Cellino carried out a press conference unveiling Adam Pearson as the club's Executive Director to work directly alongside Cellino. The press conference included Cellino leaving halfway through for a cigarette break only to return, and for the press conference to run for over an hour, with Cellino refusing to reveal the future of Redfearn.However, on 16 May, with speculation mounting further about his future as Leeds United Head Coach, Cellino in an interview with The Sunday Mirror proclaimed Redfearn to be 'weak' and 'a baby'.On 20 May 2015, Leeds announced Uwe Rösler as the new head coach, thus ending Redfearn's reign at the club, with no announcement made of Redfearn's departure as head coach, Leeds Executive Director Adam Pearson revealed in the Rosler press conference that Redfearn had been offered back his previous role as Academy Director.On 10 June 2015, Redfearn had accepted to return to his role at the academy. On 16 July 2015, Redfearn resigned as academy director.On 9 October 2015, Redfearn was appointed manager of Championship club Rotherham United on a two-and-a-half-year deal. He was dismissed as manager on 8 February 2016, with Rotherham 22nd in the table.On 29 December 2017, Doncaster Rovers Belles announced the appointment of Redfearn as their new manager. On 13 May 2018, the Belles won the FA WSL 2 title, their first trophy since 1994.On 12 June 2018, he was appointed as the new manager of Liverpool Women (then Liverpool Ladies). His first and ultimately only match in charge ended in a sobering 5–0 loss to Arsenal Women. He resigned on 14 September 2018 after just one game in charge.On 2 October 2018, Redfearn was appointed as the new assistant coach of Ben Dawson at Newcastle United U23.On 21 June 2019, Redfearn was promoted to the role of Newcastle United U23 head coach.On 4 July 2019, Redfearn was announced as the caretaker head coach, assisted by Ben Dawson after the departure of manager Rafael Benítez on 30 June. He took charge of first team training for the 2019/20 pre-season. On 5 November 2019, Redfearn stepped down from this position.On 28 August 2020, Redfearn was announced as the new head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn's father, Brian, is a former professional footballer. He is a lifelong Leeds fan. Redfearn married Susan Roberts in Dewsbury in 1985.Oldham AthleticDoncaster Rovers Belles
|
[
"Bradford City A.F.C.",
"Doncaster Rovers F.C.",
"Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C.",
"Salford City F.C.",
"Bolton Wanderers F.C.",
"Frickley Athletic F.C.",
"Barnsley F.C.",
"Scarborough F.C.",
"Boston United F.C.",
"A.F.C. Emley",
"Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C.",
"Crystal Palace F.C.",
"Rochdale A.F.C.",
"Charlton Athletic F.C.",
"Lincoln City F.C.",
"Halifax Town A.F.C.",
"Oldham Athletic A.F.C.",
"Bridlington Town A.F.C.",
"Wigan Athletic F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Neil Redfearn play for in 12-Oct-198912-October-1989?
|
October 12, 1989
|
{
"text": [
"Watford F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q6065586_P54_4
|
Neil Redfearn plays for Charlton Athletic F.C. from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 1999.
Neil Redfearn plays for Frickley Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Barnsley F.C. from Jan, 1991 to Jan, 1998.
Neil Redfearn plays for Boston United F.C. from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Rochdale A.F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2004.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C. from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Salford City F.C. from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bridlington Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Scarborough F.C. from Jan, 2004 to Jan, 2006.
Neil Redfearn plays for Doncaster Rovers F.C. from Jan, 1986 to Jan, 1987.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bradford City A.F.C. from Jan, 1999 to Jan, 2000.
Neil Redfearn plays for Crystal Palace F.C. from Jan, 1987 to Jan, 1989.
Neil Redfearn plays for Bolton Wanderers F.C. from Jan, 1982 to Jan, 1984.
Neil Redfearn plays for Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C. from Jan, 2007 to Jan, 2007.
Neil Redfearn plays for Oldham Athletic A.F.C. from Jan, 1990 to Jan, 1991.
Neil Redfearn plays for Wigan Athletic F.C. from Jan, 2000 to Jan, 2001.
Neil Redfearn plays for A.F.C. Emley from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2008.
Neil Redfearn plays for Lincoln City F.C. from Jan, 1984 to Jan, 1986.
Neil Redfearn plays for Halifax Town A.F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2002.
Neil Redfearn plays for Watford F.C. from Jan, 1989 to Jan, 1990.
|
Neil RedfearnNeil David Redfearn (born 20 June 1965) is an English former professional footballer who played as a midfielder, and is currently head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn played 790 matches in the Football League, the fifth highest total of all-time, and more than a thousand first team games overall in a career that has spanned 24 years. He has had spells as caretaker manager of Halifax Town and York City and as manager of Scarborough, Northwich Victoria and Leeds United.Born in Dewsbury, West Riding of Yorkshire, Redfearn began his career at Bolton Wanderers on 23 June 1982, having previously been on the books of Nottingham Forest's youth team. He later made his name as goalscoring midfielder at lower-division sides Lincoln City and Doncaster Rovers. In May 1985 he was to witness a nightmare when 56 spectators were killed in a horrendous stand fire while playing for Lincoln against Bradford City. In 1987, he was signed by Crystal Palace for £100,000, and he later played for Watford, before moving again in 1989 to Oldham Athletic.Redfearn's last season with Oldham constituted a career highlight as he was an ever-present in the team that won the Second Division title and returned the Latics to the top-flight of English football after a gap of 68 years. Redfearn converted the injury time penalty kick in the final game of the season against Sheffield Wednesday that completed a 3–2 victory (after Oldham had trailed 2–0), and snatched the championship from West Ham United, who had prematurely been handed the trophy some 15 minutes earlier. Despite his contribution to Oldham's promotion, he became surplus to requirements with the re-signing of former club captain Mike Milligan from Everton in the off-season and Redfearn was transferred without playing for Oldham in the top flight.In September 1991, Redfearn joined Barnsley, and it was at this club he arguably spent his prime years. In his seven seasons at Oakwell, he rarely missed a single game, and was named club captain and penalty taker. In the 1996–97 season, Redfearn scored 17 goals as Barnsley won promotion to the FA Premier League for the first time in the club's history. Redfearn missed only one game, and was Barnsley's top scorer with ten league goals in the 1997–98 season. These included Barnsley's first ever top division goal on the opening day of the season, when he put them ahead in the ninth minute at home to West Ham United, although they ended up losing the game 2–1.It was not enough to save them though, as Barnsley were relegated that season. However, despite being in his thirties, Redfearn's performances had made him a wanted man in the Premier League, and he was signed by Charlton Athletic for £1 million in the summer of 1998. He left Barnsley having played 338 first team games, scoring 84 goals.In the 1998–99 season, his family did not settle in London, and at the end of the season, Redfearn jumped at the chance of returning to his native Yorkshire, when Bradford City paid £250,000 for his services. Redfearn did not make much impact at Bradford, scoring just once against Leicester City, and joined his 10th team, Wigan Athletic after just nine months in Bradford. Despite a very good goalscoring record, Redfearn never became first-choice at Wigan either, and he dropped down two divisions to join Halifax Town in 2001.At Halifax, he also got his first taste of management, being appointed caretaker manager alongside Tony Parks following the resignation of Paul Bracewell on 30 August 2001. His spell as caretaker manager came to an end on 12 October following the appointment of Alan Little. Redfearn started a second spell in caretaker charge on 4 March 2002 due to the enforced absence of Little. However, his contract with the club was terminated on 25 April and having been snubbed for the permanent manager's job he joined Boston United as player-coach.Redfearn spent the better part of two years at Boston, before finishing his Football League career at Rochdale in the spring of 2004. Rochdale did not offer him a new contract at the end of the season, meaning he finished his Football League career with 790 appearances and so being fifth in the all-time list of most Football League appearances. His last league appearance for Rochdale took his total to . after which Redfearn dropped down to the Conference, where he became player-coach at Scarborough, managed at the time by his former Oldham teammate Nick Henry. He signed a new contract with Scarborough in April 2005. When Henry was dismissed on 24 October 2005 Redfearn was named caretaker manager, before being appointed permanently on 1 November while remaining registered as a player. Redfearn resigned on 6 July 2006 after Mark Patterson was brought in as assistant manager. He subsequently signed with Northern Premier League First Division side Bradford Park Avenue later that month. He made his 1,000th competitive appearance on 4 November 2006, when Bradford Park Avenue faced Solihull Borough in the second qualifying round of the FA Trophy.Redfearn quit Bradford Park Avenue in March 2007, joining Northern Premier League First Division rivals Stocksbridge Park Steels, but left on 19 June to become manager of Conference Premier side Northwich Victoria. He resigned on 17 September 2007, after the club only managed one point from their first nine games, leaving them bottom of the Conference Premier.He joined Northern Premier League Premier Division club Frickley Athletic as a player in September 2007. He left the club over a month later to join Bridlington Town on 5 November. He left them in January 2008 after the departure of manager Ash Berry. He was appointed as York City's youth team coach in February. He joined Emley in July, where he would play when his commitments with York's youth team allowed. Redfearn moved onto Salford City of the Northern Premier League Division One North in October 2008. He took over as caretaker manager at York on 21 November 2008, following Colin Walker's dismissal, and was in charge for the team's 2–2 draw against Crawley Town. Following Martin Foyle's appointment as manager on 24 November, Redfearn took up the position of assistant manager at the club.Redfearn left York over a month later after being appointed coach of the under-18 academy team at Leeds United on 30 December 2008 and he assumed this role on 1 January 2009. He took over as manager of the Leeds reserve team in December 2010 following the dismissal of Neil Thompson. He was appointed caretaker manager at Leeds following the dismissal of manager Simon Grayson on 1 February 2012. Three days later he won his first match in charge by beating Bristol City 3–0. It was later confirmed by club chairman Ken Bates that Redfearn would retain the managerial post for the following three games. After two wins and two defeats in his four-game spell as manager, Redfearn was replaced as manager by Neil Warnock as permanent manager on 18 February 2012. In April 2012, Redfearn guided Leeds' Under 18's side to a second-place finish in the Under-18s League, narrowly missing out on top spot to Newcastle's Under-18s team.Following the departure of Neil Warnock on 1 April 2013, Redfearn again took charge of the first team for the game at for the 2–1 away defeat against Charlton Athletic on 6 April. In April 2013 manager Brian McDermott announced that Redfearn would become the new First Team Coach as well as combining his role as Reserve Team/Development Squad manager. When McDermott left in May 2014 Redfearn stood down from his role of first team coach to continue his role as reserve team/development squad manager as well as his role of Academy Manager.Redfearn's spell as the Head of Academy was heavily praised due to the influx of Leeds academy players breaking through into the first team such as Dominic Poleon, Chris Dawson, Sam Byram, Alex Mowatt, Lewis Cook and Kalvin Phillips.On 28 August 2014, Redfearn was appointed caretaker head coach after head coach Dave Hockaday and his assistant Junior Lewis were dismissed by owner Massimo Cellino, having been in the job for only 70 days. This was the third time Redfearn had been appointed as a caretaker manager/head coach of Leeds. Redfearn picked up a victory in his first game back in charge with a 1–0 win on 30 August against Bolton Wanderers. On 20 September, Redfearn's Leeds picked up a 3–0 win over local rivals Huddersfield Town. After recording a record of three wins and one draw in his latest stint as caretaker, Leeds announced that Redfearn would be stepping back down into a role described as "Academy manager and head of coaching." with Darko Milanič appointed the new head coach of Leeds on a two-year deal replacing previous head coach Dave Hockaday, he was joined at Leeds by his SK Sturm Graz Assistant Novica Nikčević.On 25 October 2014, Milanič was dismissed by the club after only 32 days in charge. Cellino confirmed that Redfearn would be appointed as Leeds' new head coach. On 27 October 2014 Redfearn confirmed that he verbally agreed to become head coach of Leeds after receiving reassurances that if it does not work out, he will revert to his previous job back in the academy. On 1 November 2014, Redfearn was confirmed as the club's new head coach, on an initial 12-month contract with the option of a further 12 months, the contract also had a clause that would see Redfearn return to the academy if he was to leave his role as head coach. On 18 December 2014, Steve Thompson was hired as Redfearn's new assistant manager.After a change in formation, with Redfearn playing a 4–2–3–1 formation, 2015 saw Leeds pick up an upturn in form, helping Leeds climb from towards the relegation zone positions to a midtable position.On 2 April 2015, Redfearn's assistant Steve Thompson was suspended by Leeds for an 'internal matter' by Leeds Sporting Director Nicola Salerno, with Redfearn advising he was kept in the dark as to the reason's why Thompson had been suspended.Also on 2 April 2015, a story emerged that Redfearn had been put under pressure to 'not select' top scorer Mirco Antenucci, because Antenucci's contract featured a clause of an extra year on his contract, should he score 12 goals in his first season. Antenucci's agent Silvio Pagliari confirmed the clause was correct. Despite this, Redfearn started Antenucci, with Antenucci making a relatively rare start against Wolverhampton Wanderers on 6 April in a 4–3 defeat. On 24 June 2015, former Sporting Director Nicola Salerno proclaimed the decision to not play Antenucci prior was Redfearn's decision.On 9 April, after rumoured Premier League interest in Alex Mowatt and teammates Lewis Cook, Charlie Taylor and Sam Byram, Redfearn challenged Leeds United's owners to keep a hold of their home grown talents.On 18 April 2015, 6 of Owner Massimo Cellino's signings (Mirco Antenucci, Giuseppe Bellusci, Souleymane Doukara, Dario Del Fabro, Marco Silvestri and Edgar Cani) controversially pulled out of the squad with an 'injury' the day before a 2–1 loss against Charlton Athletic.On 14 May 2015, Owner Massimo Cellino carried out a press conference unveiling Adam Pearson as the club's Executive Director to work directly alongside Cellino. The press conference included Cellino leaving halfway through for a cigarette break only to return, and for the press conference to run for over an hour, with Cellino refusing to reveal the future of Redfearn.However, on 16 May, with speculation mounting further about his future as Leeds United Head Coach, Cellino in an interview with The Sunday Mirror proclaimed Redfearn to be 'weak' and 'a baby'.On 20 May 2015, Leeds announced Uwe Rösler as the new head coach, thus ending Redfearn's reign at the club, with no announcement made of Redfearn's departure as head coach, Leeds Executive Director Adam Pearson revealed in the Rosler press conference that Redfearn had been offered back his previous role as Academy Director.On 10 June 2015, Redfearn had accepted to return to his role at the academy. On 16 July 2015, Redfearn resigned as academy director.On 9 October 2015, Redfearn was appointed manager of Championship club Rotherham United on a two-and-a-half-year deal. He was dismissed as manager on 8 February 2016, with Rotherham 22nd in the table.On 29 December 2017, Doncaster Rovers Belles announced the appointment of Redfearn as their new manager. On 13 May 2018, the Belles won the FA WSL 2 title, their first trophy since 1994.On 12 June 2018, he was appointed as the new manager of Liverpool Women (then Liverpool Ladies). His first and ultimately only match in charge ended in a sobering 5–0 loss to Arsenal Women. He resigned on 14 September 2018 after just one game in charge.On 2 October 2018, Redfearn was appointed as the new assistant coach of Ben Dawson at Newcastle United U23.On 21 June 2019, Redfearn was promoted to the role of Newcastle United U23 head coach.On 4 July 2019, Redfearn was announced as the caretaker head coach, assisted by Ben Dawson after the departure of manager Rafael Benítez on 30 June. He took charge of first team training for the 2019/20 pre-season. On 5 November 2019, Redfearn stepped down from this position.On 28 August 2020, Redfearn was announced as the new head coach of Sheffield United Women.Redfearn's father, Brian, is a former professional footballer. He is a lifelong Leeds fan. Redfearn married Susan Roberts in Dewsbury in 1985.Oldham AthleticDoncaster Rovers Belles
|
[
"Bradford City A.F.C.",
"Doncaster Rovers F.C.",
"Stocksbridge Park Steels F.C.",
"Salford City F.C.",
"Bolton Wanderers F.C.",
"Frickley Athletic F.C.",
"Barnsley F.C.",
"Scarborough F.C.",
"Boston United F.C.",
"A.F.C. Emley",
"Bradford (Park Avenue) A.F.C.",
"Crystal Palace F.C.",
"Rochdale A.F.C.",
"Charlton Athletic F.C.",
"Lincoln City F.C.",
"Halifax Town A.F.C.",
"Oldham Athletic A.F.C.",
"Bridlington Town A.F.C.",
"Wigan Athletic F.C."
] |
|
Which employer did Michael H. Jameson work for in Nov, 1951?
|
November 06, 1951
|
{
"text": [
"University of Missouri"
]
}
|
L2_Q6830865_P108_0
|
Michael H. Jameson works for Stanford University from Jan, 1976 to Jan, 1990.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Pennsylvania from Jan, 1954 to Jan, 1976.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Missouri from Jan, 1950 to Jan, 1953.
|
Michael H. JamesonMichael Hamilton Jameson (London 15 October 1924 – 18 August 2004) was a classicist. At the time of his death he was Crossett Professor Emeritus of Humanistic Studies at Stanford University.His father, Raymond D. Jameson, professor of Western literature at the University of Peking, and mother, Rose Perel Jameson, were visiting London at the time of his birth. He spent his childhood in Beijing and with his mother in London, received his A.B. in Greek at the University of Chicago in 1942, aged seventeen, served in the U.S. Navy as a Japanese translator, 1943–46, then married Virginia Broyles. He received his Ph.D. at Chicago in 1949, with a dissertation on "The Offering at Meals: Its Place in Greek Sacrifice". A Fulbright Fellowship in 1949 supported him at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, where he hiked the Peloponnesos with his new wife and gained an intimate knowledge of inscriptions. After a brief stint at the University of Minnesota, he accepted a Ford Fellowship at the Institute for Social Anthropology at Oxford University. On his return to the United States, be began his long association with the University of Pennsylvania (1954–76).Though a spirit of perfectionism inhibited his production of an overarching book, in some sixty articles he explored the setting of Greek religion in its specific locality and time, thus focusing on unravelling the details of cult and ritual sacrifice; he did a great deal of work on epigraphy and its relations with literature and history, and he explored Greek sites, especially at the partly drowned port city of Halieis (Porto Cheli), which he began excavating in 1962, and in the Argolid, where he galvanized a broad ecological study, 1979–83, that was the first examination of the paleoecology of ancient Greece, resulting in the publication of M. H. Jameson, Tjeerd Van Andel and C. N. Runnels, "A Greek Countryside: The Southern Argolid from Prehistory to the Present Day" (Stanford University Press) 1994.His single most dramatic discovery was the copy of the Decree of Themistocles, mobilizing early preparations for the Battle of Salamis (470 BCE), which he recognized in a "kapheneion" (a Greek café) in Troezen and copied in a squeeze. The discovery, which adjusted the historian's view drawn from Thucydides, elicited an extensive literature, including four articles by Jameson, setting the text in its historical context.He received numerous awards and visiting fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1966–67, and inspired a generation of scholars through his teaching. He died of cancer.Jameson contributed popular articles to encyclopedias: "Greek Mythology" in N. Kramer, "The Mythologies of the Ancient World" 1961, and "Mythology, Classical" in "Collier's Encyclopedia" 17 (1995:115-17).His articles are widely scattered.
|
[
"University of Pennsylvania",
"Stanford University"
] |
|
Which employer did Michael H. Jameson work for in 1951-11-06?
|
November 06, 1951
|
{
"text": [
"University of Missouri"
]
}
|
L2_Q6830865_P108_0
|
Michael H. Jameson works for Stanford University from Jan, 1976 to Jan, 1990.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Pennsylvania from Jan, 1954 to Jan, 1976.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Missouri from Jan, 1950 to Jan, 1953.
|
Michael H. JamesonMichael Hamilton Jameson (London 15 October 1924 – 18 August 2004) was a classicist. At the time of his death he was Crossett Professor Emeritus of Humanistic Studies at Stanford University.His father, Raymond D. Jameson, professor of Western literature at the University of Peking, and mother, Rose Perel Jameson, were visiting London at the time of his birth. He spent his childhood in Beijing and with his mother in London, received his A.B. in Greek at the University of Chicago in 1942, aged seventeen, served in the U.S. Navy as a Japanese translator, 1943–46, then married Virginia Broyles. He received his Ph.D. at Chicago in 1949, with a dissertation on "The Offering at Meals: Its Place in Greek Sacrifice". A Fulbright Fellowship in 1949 supported him at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, where he hiked the Peloponnesos with his new wife and gained an intimate knowledge of inscriptions. After a brief stint at the University of Minnesota, he accepted a Ford Fellowship at the Institute for Social Anthropology at Oxford University. On his return to the United States, be began his long association with the University of Pennsylvania (1954–76).Though a spirit of perfectionism inhibited his production of an overarching book, in some sixty articles he explored the setting of Greek religion in its specific locality and time, thus focusing on unravelling the details of cult and ritual sacrifice; he did a great deal of work on epigraphy and its relations with literature and history, and he explored Greek sites, especially at the partly drowned port city of Halieis (Porto Cheli), which he began excavating in 1962, and in the Argolid, where he galvanized a broad ecological study, 1979–83, that was the first examination of the paleoecology of ancient Greece, resulting in the publication of M. H. Jameson, Tjeerd Van Andel and C. N. Runnels, "A Greek Countryside: The Southern Argolid from Prehistory to the Present Day" (Stanford University Press) 1994.His single most dramatic discovery was the copy of the Decree of Themistocles, mobilizing early preparations for the Battle of Salamis (470 BCE), which he recognized in a "kapheneion" (a Greek café) in Troezen and copied in a squeeze. The discovery, which adjusted the historian's view drawn from Thucydides, elicited an extensive literature, including four articles by Jameson, setting the text in its historical context.He received numerous awards and visiting fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1966–67, and inspired a generation of scholars through his teaching. He died of cancer.Jameson contributed popular articles to encyclopedias: "Greek Mythology" in N. Kramer, "The Mythologies of the Ancient World" 1961, and "Mythology, Classical" in "Collier's Encyclopedia" 17 (1995:115-17).His articles are widely scattered.
|
[
"University of Pennsylvania",
"Stanford University"
] |
|
Which employer did Michael H. Jameson work for in 06/11/1951?
|
November 06, 1951
|
{
"text": [
"University of Missouri"
]
}
|
L2_Q6830865_P108_0
|
Michael H. Jameson works for Stanford University from Jan, 1976 to Jan, 1990.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Pennsylvania from Jan, 1954 to Jan, 1976.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Missouri from Jan, 1950 to Jan, 1953.
|
Michael H. JamesonMichael Hamilton Jameson (London 15 October 1924 – 18 August 2004) was a classicist. At the time of his death he was Crossett Professor Emeritus of Humanistic Studies at Stanford University.His father, Raymond D. Jameson, professor of Western literature at the University of Peking, and mother, Rose Perel Jameson, were visiting London at the time of his birth. He spent his childhood in Beijing and with his mother in London, received his A.B. in Greek at the University of Chicago in 1942, aged seventeen, served in the U.S. Navy as a Japanese translator, 1943–46, then married Virginia Broyles. He received his Ph.D. at Chicago in 1949, with a dissertation on "The Offering at Meals: Its Place in Greek Sacrifice". A Fulbright Fellowship in 1949 supported him at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, where he hiked the Peloponnesos with his new wife and gained an intimate knowledge of inscriptions. After a brief stint at the University of Minnesota, he accepted a Ford Fellowship at the Institute for Social Anthropology at Oxford University. On his return to the United States, be began his long association with the University of Pennsylvania (1954–76).Though a spirit of perfectionism inhibited his production of an overarching book, in some sixty articles he explored the setting of Greek religion in its specific locality and time, thus focusing on unravelling the details of cult and ritual sacrifice; he did a great deal of work on epigraphy and its relations with literature and history, and he explored Greek sites, especially at the partly drowned port city of Halieis (Porto Cheli), which he began excavating in 1962, and in the Argolid, where he galvanized a broad ecological study, 1979–83, that was the first examination of the paleoecology of ancient Greece, resulting in the publication of M. H. Jameson, Tjeerd Van Andel and C. N. Runnels, "A Greek Countryside: The Southern Argolid from Prehistory to the Present Day" (Stanford University Press) 1994.His single most dramatic discovery was the copy of the Decree of Themistocles, mobilizing early preparations for the Battle of Salamis (470 BCE), which he recognized in a "kapheneion" (a Greek café) in Troezen and copied in a squeeze. The discovery, which adjusted the historian's view drawn from Thucydides, elicited an extensive literature, including four articles by Jameson, setting the text in its historical context.He received numerous awards and visiting fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1966–67, and inspired a generation of scholars through his teaching. He died of cancer.Jameson contributed popular articles to encyclopedias: "Greek Mythology" in N. Kramer, "The Mythologies of the Ancient World" 1961, and "Mythology, Classical" in "Collier's Encyclopedia" 17 (1995:115-17).His articles are widely scattered.
|
[
"University of Pennsylvania",
"Stanford University"
] |
|
Which employer did Michael H. Jameson work for in Nov 06, 1951?
|
November 06, 1951
|
{
"text": [
"University of Missouri"
]
}
|
L2_Q6830865_P108_0
|
Michael H. Jameson works for Stanford University from Jan, 1976 to Jan, 1990.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Pennsylvania from Jan, 1954 to Jan, 1976.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Missouri from Jan, 1950 to Jan, 1953.
|
Michael H. JamesonMichael Hamilton Jameson (London 15 October 1924 – 18 August 2004) was a classicist. At the time of his death he was Crossett Professor Emeritus of Humanistic Studies at Stanford University.His father, Raymond D. Jameson, professor of Western literature at the University of Peking, and mother, Rose Perel Jameson, were visiting London at the time of his birth. He spent his childhood in Beijing and with his mother in London, received his A.B. in Greek at the University of Chicago in 1942, aged seventeen, served in the U.S. Navy as a Japanese translator, 1943–46, then married Virginia Broyles. He received his Ph.D. at Chicago in 1949, with a dissertation on "The Offering at Meals: Its Place in Greek Sacrifice". A Fulbright Fellowship in 1949 supported him at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, where he hiked the Peloponnesos with his new wife and gained an intimate knowledge of inscriptions. After a brief stint at the University of Minnesota, he accepted a Ford Fellowship at the Institute for Social Anthropology at Oxford University. On his return to the United States, be began his long association with the University of Pennsylvania (1954–76).Though a spirit of perfectionism inhibited his production of an overarching book, in some sixty articles he explored the setting of Greek religion in its specific locality and time, thus focusing on unravelling the details of cult and ritual sacrifice; he did a great deal of work on epigraphy and its relations with literature and history, and he explored Greek sites, especially at the partly drowned port city of Halieis (Porto Cheli), which he began excavating in 1962, and in the Argolid, where he galvanized a broad ecological study, 1979–83, that was the first examination of the paleoecology of ancient Greece, resulting in the publication of M. H. Jameson, Tjeerd Van Andel and C. N. Runnels, "A Greek Countryside: The Southern Argolid from Prehistory to the Present Day" (Stanford University Press) 1994.His single most dramatic discovery was the copy of the Decree of Themistocles, mobilizing early preparations for the Battle of Salamis (470 BCE), which he recognized in a "kapheneion" (a Greek café) in Troezen and copied in a squeeze. The discovery, which adjusted the historian's view drawn from Thucydides, elicited an extensive literature, including four articles by Jameson, setting the text in its historical context.He received numerous awards and visiting fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1966–67, and inspired a generation of scholars through his teaching. He died of cancer.Jameson contributed popular articles to encyclopedias: "Greek Mythology" in N. Kramer, "The Mythologies of the Ancient World" 1961, and "Mythology, Classical" in "Collier's Encyclopedia" 17 (1995:115-17).His articles are widely scattered.
|
[
"University of Pennsylvania",
"Stanford University"
] |
|
Which employer did Michael H. Jameson work for in 11/06/1951?
|
November 06, 1951
|
{
"text": [
"University of Missouri"
]
}
|
L2_Q6830865_P108_0
|
Michael H. Jameson works for Stanford University from Jan, 1976 to Jan, 1990.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Pennsylvania from Jan, 1954 to Jan, 1976.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Missouri from Jan, 1950 to Jan, 1953.
|
Michael H. JamesonMichael Hamilton Jameson (London 15 October 1924 – 18 August 2004) was a classicist. At the time of his death he was Crossett Professor Emeritus of Humanistic Studies at Stanford University.His father, Raymond D. Jameson, professor of Western literature at the University of Peking, and mother, Rose Perel Jameson, were visiting London at the time of his birth. He spent his childhood in Beijing and with his mother in London, received his A.B. in Greek at the University of Chicago in 1942, aged seventeen, served in the U.S. Navy as a Japanese translator, 1943–46, then married Virginia Broyles. He received his Ph.D. at Chicago in 1949, with a dissertation on "The Offering at Meals: Its Place in Greek Sacrifice". A Fulbright Fellowship in 1949 supported him at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, where he hiked the Peloponnesos with his new wife and gained an intimate knowledge of inscriptions. After a brief stint at the University of Minnesota, he accepted a Ford Fellowship at the Institute for Social Anthropology at Oxford University. On his return to the United States, be began his long association with the University of Pennsylvania (1954–76).Though a spirit of perfectionism inhibited his production of an overarching book, in some sixty articles he explored the setting of Greek religion in its specific locality and time, thus focusing on unravelling the details of cult and ritual sacrifice; he did a great deal of work on epigraphy and its relations with literature and history, and he explored Greek sites, especially at the partly drowned port city of Halieis (Porto Cheli), which he began excavating in 1962, and in the Argolid, where he galvanized a broad ecological study, 1979–83, that was the first examination of the paleoecology of ancient Greece, resulting in the publication of M. H. Jameson, Tjeerd Van Andel and C. N. Runnels, "A Greek Countryside: The Southern Argolid from Prehistory to the Present Day" (Stanford University Press) 1994.His single most dramatic discovery was the copy of the Decree of Themistocles, mobilizing early preparations for the Battle of Salamis (470 BCE), which he recognized in a "kapheneion" (a Greek café) in Troezen and copied in a squeeze. The discovery, which adjusted the historian's view drawn from Thucydides, elicited an extensive literature, including four articles by Jameson, setting the text in its historical context.He received numerous awards and visiting fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1966–67, and inspired a generation of scholars through his teaching. He died of cancer.Jameson contributed popular articles to encyclopedias: "Greek Mythology" in N. Kramer, "The Mythologies of the Ancient World" 1961, and "Mythology, Classical" in "Collier's Encyclopedia" 17 (1995:115-17).His articles are widely scattered.
|
[
"University of Pennsylvania",
"Stanford University"
] |
|
Which employer did Michael H. Jameson work for in 06-Nov-195106-November-1951?
|
November 06, 1951
|
{
"text": [
"University of Missouri"
]
}
|
L2_Q6830865_P108_0
|
Michael H. Jameson works for Stanford University from Jan, 1976 to Jan, 1990.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Pennsylvania from Jan, 1954 to Jan, 1976.
Michael H. Jameson works for University of Missouri from Jan, 1950 to Jan, 1953.
|
Michael H. JamesonMichael Hamilton Jameson (London 15 October 1924 – 18 August 2004) was a classicist. At the time of his death he was Crossett Professor Emeritus of Humanistic Studies at Stanford University.His father, Raymond D. Jameson, professor of Western literature at the University of Peking, and mother, Rose Perel Jameson, were visiting London at the time of his birth. He spent his childhood in Beijing and with his mother in London, received his A.B. in Greek at the University of Chicago in 1942, aged seventeen, served in the U.S. Navy as a Japanese translator, 1943–46, then married Virginia Broyles. He received his Ph.D. at Chicago in 1949, with a dissertation on "The Offering at Meals: Its Place in Greek Sacrifice". A Fulbright Fellowship in 1949 supported him at the American School of Classical Studies at Athens, where he hiked the Peloponnesos with his new wife and gained an intimate knowledge of inscriptions. After a brief stint at the University of Minnesota, he accepted a Ford Fellowship at the Institute for Social Anthropology at Oxford University. On his return to the United States, be began his long association with the University of Pennsylvania (1954–76).Though a spirit of perfectionism inhibited his production of an overarching book, in some sixty articles he explored the setting of Greek religion in its specific locality and time, thus focusing on unravelling the details of cult and ritual sacrifice; he did a great deal of work on epigraphy and its relations with literature and history, and he explored Greek sites, especially at the partly drowned port city of Halieis (Porto Cheli), which he began excavating in 1962, and in the Argolid, where he galvanized a broad ecological study, 1979–83, that was the first examination of the paleoecology of ancient Greece, resulting in the publication of M. H. Jameson, Tjeerd Van Andel and C. N. Runnels, "A Greek Countryside: The Southern Argolid from Prehistory to the Present Day" (Stanford University Press) 1994.His single most dramatic discovery was the copy of the Decree of Themistocles, mobilizing early preparations for the Battle of Salamis (470 BCE), which he recognized in a "kapheneion" (a Greek café) in Troezen and copied in a squeeze. The discovery, which adjusted the historian's view drawn from Thucydides, elicited an extensive literature, including four articles by Jameson, setting the text in its historical context.He received numerous awards and visiting fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1966–67, and inspired a generation of scholars through his teaching. He died of cancer.Jameson contributed popular articles to encyclopedias: "Greek Mythology" in N. Kramer, "The Mythologies of the Ancient World" 1961, and "Mythology, Classical" in "Collier's Encyclopedia" 17 (1995:115-17).His articles are widely scattered.
|
[
"University of Pennsylvania",
"Stanford University"
] |
|
Which team did Aritz Borda play for in Sep, 2012?
|
September 25, 2012
|
{
"text": [
"APOEL F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q4791149_P54_3
|
Aritz Borda plays for Burgos CF from Jan, 2017 to Jan, 2019.
Aritz Borda plays for Athletic Bilbao B from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Sociedad B from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2007.
Aritz Borda plays for Club Deportivo Mirandés from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Aritz Borda plays for FC Rapid București from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Muangthong United F.C. from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Western Sydney Wanderers FC from Jan, 2016 to Jan, 2017.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Unión from Jan, 2019 to Jan, 2021.
Aritz Borda plays for Deportivo Alavés from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2016.
Aritz Borda plays for APOEL F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2014.
|
Aritz BordaAritz Borda Etxezarreta (born 3 January 1985) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays for Real Unión as a central defender.Born in Lasarte-Oria, Gipuzkoa, Borda spent his first seven seasons as a senior in the third division, competing exclusively in his native Basque Country with the exception of CD Mirandés, which he represented in 2010–11, starting in all the league matches he appeared in for the Castile and León side as they fell short in the promotion playoffs.Borda joined Recreativo de Huelva of the second level for 2011–12 campaign. He made his official debut with the Andalusians on 7 September 2011, in a 0–2 home loss against Elche CF in the second round of the Copa del Rey. His league debut arrived on 22 October, as he again played the full 90 minutes in a 1–2 defeat at AD Alcorcón; he scored his first goal as a professional on 13 November, helping to a 4–2 home win over UD Las Palmas.On 14 June 2012, aged 27, Borda moved abroad for the first time and signed a two-year contract with Cypriot club APOEL FC. He scored his first goal for his new team on 11 November, netting the game's only at Ethnikos Achna FC, and won the First Division in his first season for the first major accolade of his career.During 2013–14, Borda appeared in five games in the group stage of the UEFA Europa League, and helped to a treble conquest of league, Cup and Super Cup. After leaving in June 2014, he went on to play with Thai Premier League's Muangthong United F.C. for a few months.Borda switched clubs and countries again on 4 February 2015, joining FC Rapid București from the Romanian Liga I. On 13 July he returned to his native country, after agreeing to a one-year deal with Deportivo Alavés.On 5 July 2016, Borda signed a two-year contract with Australian club Western Sydney Wanderers FC. On 29 July 2017 he left by mutual consent, after an extremely poor start to the season which saw him give away penalties and be sent off twice, being subsequently dropped from the squad. His only match after was the final game of the season when the Wanderers rested several other players prior to starting the finals play-offs.Borda was described as a central defender with a very good aerial game. He was strong in the challenge and was a good passer of the ball with both feet; additionally, he was proficient in build up play and had the ability to score goals from set pieces in attack.APOELAlavés
|
[
"Western Sydney Wanderers FC",
"Real Sociedad B",
"FC Rapid București",
"Real Unión",
"Club Deportivo Mirandés",
"Deportivo Alavés",
"Burgos CF",
"Muangthong United F.C.",
"Athletic Bilbao B"
] |
|
Which team did Aritz Borda play for in 2012-09-25?
|
September 25, 2012
|
{
"text": [
"APOEL F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q4791149_P54_3
|
Aritz Borda plays for Burgos CF from Jan, 2017 to Jan, 2019.
Aritz Borda plays for Athletic Bilbao B from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Sociedad B from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2007.
Aritz Borda plays for Club Deportivo Mirandés from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Aritz Borda plays for FC Rapid București from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Muangthong United F.C. from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Western Sydney Wanderers FC from Jan, 2016 to Jan, 2017.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Unión from Jan, 2019 to Jan, 2021.
Aritz Borda plays for Deportivo Alavés from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2016.
Aritz Borda plays for APOEL F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2014.
|
Aritz BordaAritz Borda Etxezarreta (born 3 January 1985) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays for Real Unión as a central defender.Born in Lasarte-Oria, Gipuzkoa, Borda spent his first seven seasons as a senior in the third division, competing exclusively in his native Basque Country with the exception of CD Mirandés, which he represented in 2010–11, starting in all the league matches he appeared in for the Castile and León side as they fell short in the promotion playoffs.Borda joined Recreativo de Huelva of the second level for 2011–12 campaign. He made his official debut with the Andalusians on 7 September 2011, in a 0–2 home loss against Elche CF in the second round of the Copa del Rey. His league debut arrived on 22 October, as he again played the full 90 minutes in a 1–2 defeat at AD Alcorcón; he scored his first goal as a professional on 13 November, helping to a 4–2 home win over UD Las Palmas.On 14 June 2012, aged 27, Borda moved abroad for the first time and signed a two-year contract with Cypriot club APOEL FC. He scored his first goal for his new team on 11 November, netting the game's only at Ethnikos Achna FC, and won the First Division in his first season for the first major accolade of his career.During 2013–14, Borda appeared in five games in the group stage of the UEFA Europa League, and helped to a treble conquest of league, Cup and Super Cup. After leaving in June 2014, he went on to play with Thai Premier League's Muangthong United F.C. for a few months.Borda switched clubs and countries again on 4 February 2015, joining FC Rapid București from the Romanian Liga I. On 13 July he returned to his native country, after agreeing to a one-year deal with Deportivo Alavés.On 5 July 2016, Borda signed a two-year contract with Australian club Western Sydney Wanderers FC. On 29 July 2017 he left by mutual consent, after an extremely poor start to the season which saw him give away penalties and be sent off twice, being subsequently dropped from the squad. His only match after was the final game of the season when the Wanderers rested several other players prior to starting the finals play-offs.Borda was described as a central defender with a very good aerial game. He was strong in the challenge and was a good passer of the ball with both feet; additionally, he was proficient in build up play and had the ability to score goals from set pieces in attack.APOELAlavés
|
[
"Western Sydney Wanderers FC",
"Real Sociedad B",
"FC Rapid București",
"Real Unión",
"Club Deportivo Mirandés",
"Deportivo Alavés",
"Burgos CF",
"Muangthong United F.C.",
"Athletic Bilbao B"
] |
|
Which team did Aritz Borda play for in 25/09/2012?
|
September 25, 2012
|
{
"text": [
"APOEL F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q4791149_P54_3
|
Aritz Borda plays for Burgos CF from Jan, 2017 to Jan, 2019.
Aritz Borda plays for Athletic Bilbao B from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Sociedad B from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2007.
Aritz Borda plays for Club Deportivo Mirandés from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Aritz Borda plays for FC Rapid București from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Muangthong United F.C. from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Western Sydney Wanderers FC from Jan, 2016 to Jan, 2017.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Unión from Jan, 2019 to Jan, 2021.
Aritz Borda plays for Deportivo Alavés from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2016.
Aritz Borda plays for APOEL F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2014.
|
Aritz BordaAritz Borda Etxezarreta (born 3 January 1985) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays for Real Unión as a central defender.Born in Lasarte-Oria, Gipuzkoa, Borda spent his first seven seasons as a senior in the third division, competing exclusively in his native Basque Country with the exception of CD Mirandés, which he represented in 2010–11, starting in all the league matches he appeared in for the Castile and León side as they fell short in the promotion playoffs.Borda joined Recreativo de Huelva of the second level for 2011–12 campaign. He made his official debut with the Andalusians on 7 September 2011, in a 0–2 home loss against Elche CF in the second round of the Copa del Rey. His league debut arrived on 22 October, as he again played the full 90 minutes in a 1–2 defeat at AD Alcorcón; he scored his first goal as a professional on 13 November, helping to a 4–2 home win over UD Las Palmas.On 14 June 2012, aged 27, Borda moved abroad for the first time and signed a two-year contract with Cypriot club APOEL FC. He scored his first goal for his new team on 11 November, netting the game's only at Ethnikos Achna FC, and won the First Division in his first season for the first major accolade of his career.During 2013–14, Borda appeared in five games in the group stage of the UEFA Europa League, and helped to a treble conquest of league, Cup and Super Cup. After leaving in June 2014, he went on to play with Thai Premier League's Muangthong United F.C. for a few months.Borda switched clubs and countries again on 4 February 2015, joining FC Rapid București from the Romanian Liga I. On 13 July he returned to his native country, after agreeing to a one-year deal with Deportivo Alavés.On 5 July 2016, Borda signed a two-year contract with Australian club Western Sydney Wanderers FC. On 29 July 2017 he left by mutual consent, after an extremely poor start to the season which saw him give away penalties and be sent off twice, being subsequently dropped from the squad. His only match after was the final game of the season when the Wanderers rested several other players prior to starting the finals play-offs.Borda was described as a central defender with a very good aerial game. He was strong in the challenge and was a good passer of the ball with both feet; additionally, he was proficient in build up play and had the ability to score goals from set pieces in attack.APOELAlavés
|
[
"Western Sydney Wanderers FC",
"Real Sociedad B",
"FC Rapid București",
"Real Unión",
"Club Deportivo Mirandés",
"Deportivo Alavés",
"Burgos CF",
"Muangthong United F.C.",
"Athletic Bilbao B"
] |
|
Which team did Aritz Borda play for in Sep 25, 2012?
|
September 25, 2012
|
{
"text": [
"APOEL F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q4791149_P54_3
|
Aritz Borda plays for Burgos CF from Jan, 2017 to Jan, 2019.
Aritz Borda plays for Athletic Bilbao B from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Sociedad B from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2007.
Aritz Borda plays for Club Deportivo Mirandés from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Aritz Borda plays for FC Rapid București from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Muangthong United F.C. from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Western Sydney Wanderers FC from Jan, 2016 to Jan, 2017.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Unión from Jan, 2019 to Jan, 2021.
Aritz Borda plays for Deportivo Alavés from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2016.
Aritz Borda plays for APOEL F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2014.
|
Aritz BordaAritz Borda Etxezarreta (born 3 January 1985) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays for Real Unión as a central defender.Born in Lasarte-Oria, Gipuzkoa, Borda spent his first seven seasons as a senior in the third division, competing exclusively in his native Basque Country with the exception of CD Mirandés, which he represented in 2010–11, starting in all the league matches he appeared in for the Castile and León side as they fell short in the promotion playoffs.Borda joined Recreativo de Huelva of the second level for 2011–12 campaign. He made his official debut with the Andalusians on 7 September 2011, in a 0–2 home loss against Elche CF in the second round of the Copa del Rey. His league debut arrived on 22 October, as he again played the full 90 minutes in a 1–2 defeat at AD Alcorcón; he scored his first goal as a professional on 13 November, helping to a 4–2 home win over UD Las Palmas.On 14 June 2012, aged 27, Borda moved abroad for the first time and signed a two-year contract with Cypriot club APOEL FC. He scored his first goal for his new team on 11 November, netting the game's only at Ethnikos Achna FC, and won the First Division in his first season for the first major accolade of his career.During 2013–14, Borda appeared in five games in the group stage of the UEFA Europa League, and helped to a treble conquest of league, Cup and Super Cup. After leaving in June 2014, he went on to play with Thai Premier League's Muangthong United F.C. for a few months.Borda switched clubs and countries again on 4 February 2015, joining FC Rapid București from the Romanian Liga I. On 13 July he returned to his native country, after agreeing to a one-year deal with Deportivo Alavés.On 5 July 2016, Borda signed a two-year contract with Australian club Western Sydney Wanderers FC. On 29 July 2017 he left by mutual consent, after an extremely poor start to the season which saw him give away penalties and be sent off twice, being subsequently dropped from the squad. His only match after was the final game of the season when the Wanderers rested several other players prior to starting the finals play-offs.Borda was described as a central defender with a very good aerial game. He was strong in the challenge and was a good passer of the ball with both feet; additionally, he was proficient in build up play and had the ability to score goals from set pieces in attack.APOELAlavés
|
[
"Western Sydney Wanderers FC",
"Real Sociedad B",
"FC Rapid București",
"Real Unión",
"Club Deportivo Mirandés",
"Deportivo Alavés",
"Burgos CF",
"Muangthong United F.C.",
"Athletic Bilbao B"
] |
|
Which team did Aritz Borda play for in 09/25/2012?
|
September 25, 2012
|
{
"text": [
"APOEL F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q4791149_P54_3
|
Aritz Borda plays for Burgos CF from Jan, 2017 to Jan, 2019.
Aritz Borda plays for Athletic Bilbao B from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Sociedad B from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2007.
Aritz Borda plays for Club Deportivo Mirandés from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Aritz Borda plays for FC Rapid București from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Muangthong United F.C. from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Western Sydney Wanderers FC from Jan, 2016 to Jan, 2017.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Unión from Jan, 2019 to Jan, 2021.
Aritz Borda plays for Deportivo Alavés from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2016.
Aritz Borda plays for APOEL F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2014.
|
Aritz BordaAritz Borda Etxezarreta (born 3 January 1985) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays for Real Unión as a central defender.Born in Lasarte-Oria, Gipuzkoa, Borda spent his first seven seasons as a senior in the third division, competing exclusively in his native Basque Country with the exception of CD Mirandés, which he represented in 2010–11, starting in all the league matches he appeared in for the Castile and León side as they fell short in the promotion playoffs.Borda joined Recreativo de Huelva of the second level for 2011–12 campaign. He made his official debut with the Andalusians on 7 September 2011, in a 0–2 home loss against Elche CF in the second round of the Copa del Rey. His league debut arrived on 22 October, as he again played the full 90 minutes in a 1–2 defeat at AD Alcorcón; he scored his first goal as a professional on 13 November, helping to a 4–2 home win over UD Las Palmas.On 14 June 2012, aged 27, Borda moved abroad for the first time and signed a two-year contract with Cypriot club APOEL FC. He scored his first goal for his new team on 11 November, netting the game's only at Ethnikos Achna FC, and won the First Division in his first season for the first major accolade of his career.During 2013–14, Borda appeared in five games in the group stage of the UEFA Europa League, and helped to a treble conquest of league, Cup and Super Cup. After leaving in June 2014, he went on to play with Thai Premier League's Muangthong United F.C. for a few months.Borda switched clubs and countries again on 4 February 2015, joining FC Rapid București from the Romanian Liga I. On 13 July he returned to his native country, after agreeing to a one-year deal with Deportivo Alavés.On 5 July 2016, Borda signed a two-year contract with Australian club Western Sydney Wanderers FC. On 29 July 2017 he left by mutual consent, after an extremely poor start to the season which saw him give away penalties and be sent off twice, being subsequently dropped from the squad. His only match after was the final game of the season when the Wanderers rested several other players prior to starting the finals play-offs.Borda was described as a central defender with a very good aerial game. He was strong in the challenge and was a good passer of the ball with both feet; additionally, he was proficient in build up play and had the ability to score goals from set pieces in attack.APOELAlavés
|
[
"Western Sydney Wanderers FC",
"Real Sociedad B",
"FC Rapid București",
"Real Unión",
"Club Deportivo Mirandés",
"Deportivo Alavés",
"Burgos CF",
"Muangthong United F.C.",
"Athletic Bilbao B"
] |
|
Which team did Aritz Borda play for in 25-Sep-201225-September-2012?
|
September 25, 2012
|
{
"text": [
"APOEL F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q4791149_P54_3
|
Aritz Borda plays for Burgos CF from Jan, 2017 to Jan, 2019.
Aritz Borda plays for Athletic Bilbao B from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2010.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Sociedad B from Jan, 2002 to Jan, 2007.
Aritz Borda plays for Club Deportivo Mirandés from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Aritz Borda plays for FC Rapid București from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Muangthong United F.C. from Jan, 2014 to Jan, 2015.
Aritz Borda plays for Western Sydney Wanderers FC from Jan, 2016 to Jan, 2017.
Aritz Borda plays for Real Unión from Jan, 2019 to Jan, 2021.
Aritz Borda plays for Deportivo Alavés from Jan, 2015 to Jan, 2016.
Aritz Borda plays for APOEL F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2014.
|
Aritz BordaAritz Borda Etxezarreta (born 3 January 1985) is a Spanish professional footballer who plays for Real Unión as a central defender.Born in Lasarte-Oria, Gipuzkoa, Borda spent his first seven seasons as a senior in the third division, competing exclusively in his native Basque Country with the exception of CD Mirandés, which he represented in 2010–11, starting in all the league matches he appeared in for the Castile and León side as they fell short in the promotion playoffs.Borda joined Recreativo de Huelva of the second level for 2011–12 campaign. He made his official debut with the Andalusians on 7 September 2011, in a 0–2 home loss against Elche CF in the second round of the Copa del Rey. His league debut arrived on 22 October, as he again played the full 90 minutes in a 1–2 defeat at AD Alcorcón; he scored his first goal as a professional on 13 November, helping to a 4–2 home win over UD Las Palmas.On 14 June 2012, aged 27, Borda moved abroad for the first time and signed a two-year contract with Cypriot club APOEL FC. He scored his first goal for his new team on 11 November, netting the game's only at Ethnikos Achna FC, and won the First Division in his first season for the first major accolade of his career.During 2013–14, Borda appeared in five games in the group stage of the UEFA Europa League, and helped to a treble conquest of league, Cup and Super Cup. After leaving in June 2014, he went on to play with Thai Premier League's Muangthong United F.C. for a few months.Borda switched clubs and countries again on 4 February 2015, joining FC Rapid București from the Romanian Liga I. On 13 July he returned to his native country, after agreeing to a one-year deal with Deportivo Alavés.On 5 July 2016, Borda signed a two-year contract with Australian club Western Sydney Wanderers FC. On 29 July 2017 he left by mutual consent, after an extremely poor start to the season which saw him give away penalties and be sent off twice, being subsequently dropped from the squad. His only match after was the final game of the season when the Wanderers rested several other players prior to starting the finals play-offs.Borda was described as a central defender with a very good aerial game. He was strong in the challenge and was a good passer of the ball with both feet; additionally, he was proficient in build up play and had the ability to score goals from set pieces in attack.APOELAlavés
|
[
"Western Sydney Wanderers FC",
"Real Sociedad B",
"FC Rapid București",
"Real Unión",
"Club Deportivo Mirandés",
"Deportivo Alavés",
"Burgos CF",
"Muangthong United F.C.",
"Athletic Bilbao B"
] |
|
Who was the head of Benevento Province in Aug, 2010?
|
August 29, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Aniello Cimitile"
]
}
|
L2_Q16134_P6_1
|
Antonio Di Maria is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Oct, 2018 to Dec, 2022.
Aniello Cimitile is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2014.
Carmine Nardone is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 2008.
|
Province of BeneventoThe Province of Benevento () is a province in the Campania region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Benevento.The province has an area of 2,071 km, and, , a total population of 279,308. There are 78 "comuni" in the province (for the full list, see comuni of the Province of Benevento). The biggest municipalities, the only ones over 10,000 inhabitants, are Benevento, Montesarchio, Sant'Agata de' Goti and San Giorgio del Sannio.The territory of the province of Benevento closely approximates that of the Principality of Benevento in the mid and late eleventh century. It borders Molise (province of Campobasso) on the North, Apulia (province of Foggia) on the East, the province of Avellino and the metropolitan City of Naples on the South, and the province of Caserta on the West.The lowest point is in the comune of Limatola (44 meters above sea level), while the highest point is Monte Mutria (1822 meters), one of the mountains of the Matese range, which separates the province of Benevento from Molise.
|
[
"Antonio Di Maria",
"Carmine Nardone"
] |
|
Who was the head of Benevento Province in 2010-08-29?
|
August 29, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Aniello Cimitile"
]
}
|
L2_Q16134_P6_1
|
Antonio Di Maria is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Oct, 2018 to Dec, 2022.
Aniello Cimitile is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2014.
Carmine Nardone is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 2008.
|
Province of BeneventoThe Province of Benevento () is a province in the Campania region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Benevento.The province has an area of 2,071 km, and, , a total population of 279,308. There are 78 "comuni" in the province (for the full list, see comuni of the Province of Benevento). The biggest municipalities, the only ones over 10,000 inhabitants, are Benevento, Montesarchio, Sant'Agata de' Goti and San Giorgio del Sannio.The territory of the province of Benevento closely approximates that of the Principality of Benevento in the mid and late eleventh century. It borders Molise (province of Campobasso) on the North, Apulia (province of Foggia) on the East, the province of Avellino and the metropolitan City of Naples on the South, and the province of Caserta on the West.The lowest point is in the comune of Limatola (44 meters above sea level), while the highest point is Monte Mutria (1822 meters), one of the mountains of the Matese range, which separates the province of Benevento from Molise.
|
[
"Antonio Di Maria",
"Carmine Nardone"
] |
|
Who was the head of Benevento Province in 29/08/2010?
|
August 29, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Aniello Cimitile"
]
}
|
L2_Q16134_P6_1
|
Antonio Di Maria is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Oct, 2018 to Dec, 2022.
Aniello Cimitile is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2014.
Carmine Nardone is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 2008.
|
Province of BeneventoThe Province of Benevento () is a province in the Campania region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Benevento.The province has an area of 2,071 km, and, , a total population of 279,308. There are 78 "comuni" in the province (for the full list, see comuni of the Province of Benevento). The biggest municipalities, the only ones over 10,000 inhabitants, are Benevento, Montesarchio, Sant'Agata de' Goti and San Giorgio del Sannio.The territory of the province of Benevento closely approximates that of the Principality of Benevento in the mid and late eleventh century. It borders Molise (province of Campobasso) on the North, Apulia (province of Foggia) on the East, the province of Avellino and the metropolitan City of Naples on the South, and the province of Caserta on the West.The lowest point is in the comune of Limatola (44 meters above sea level), while the highest point is Monte Mutria (1822 meters), one of the mountains of the Matese range, which separates the province of Benevento from Molise.
|
[
"Antonio Di Maria",
"Carmine Nardone"
] |
|
Who was the head of Benevento Province in Aug 29, 2010?
|
August 29, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Aniello Cimitile"
]
}
|
L2_Q16134_P6_1
|
Antonio Di Maria is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Oct, 2018 to Dec, 2022.
Aniello Cimitile is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2014.
Carmine Nardone is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 2008.
|
Province of BeneventoThe Province of Benevento () is a province in the Campania region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Benevento.The province has an area of 2,071 km, and, , a total population of 279,308. There are 78 "comuni" in the province (for the full list, see comuni of the Province of Benevento). The biggest municipalities, the only ones over 10,000 inhabitants, are Benevento, Montesarchio, Sant'Agata de' Goti and San Giorgio del Sannio.The territory of the province of Benevento closely approximates that of the Principality of Benevento in the mid and late eleventh century. It borders Molise (province of Campobasso) on the North, Apulia (province of Foggia) on the East, the province of Avellino and the metropolitan City of Naples on the South, and the province of Caserta on the West.The lowest point is in the comune of Limatola (44 meters above sea level), while the highest point is Monte Mutria (1822 meters), one of the mountains of the Matese range, which separates the province of Benevento from Molise.
|
[
"Antonio Di Maria",
"Carmine Nardone"
] |
|
Who was the head of Benevento Province in 08/29/2010?
|
August 29, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Aniello Cimitile"
]
}
|
L2_Q16134_P6_1
|
Antonio Di Maria is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Oct, 2018 to Dec, 2022.
Aniello Cimitile is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2014.
Carmine Nardone is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 2008.
|
Province of BeneventoThe Province of Benevento () is a province in the Campania region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Benevento.The province has an area of 2,071 km, and, , a total population of 279,308. There are 78 "comuni" in the province (for the full list, see comuni of the Province of Benevento). The biggest municipalities, the only ones over 10,000 inhabitants, are Benevento, Montesarchio, Sant'Agata de' Goti and San Giorgio del Sannio.The territory of the province of Benevento closely approximates that of the Principality of Benevento in the mid and late eleventh century. It borders Molise (province of Campobasso) on the North, Apulia (province of Foggia) on the East, the province of Avellino and the metropolitan City of Naples on the South, and the province of Caserta on the West.The lowest point is in the comune of Limatola (44 meters above sea level), while the highest point is Monte Mutria (1822 meters), one of the mountains of the Matese range, which separates the province of Benevento from Molise.
|
[
"Antonio Di Maria",
"Carmine Nardone"
] |
|
Who was the head of Benevento Province in 29-Aug-201029-August-2010?
|
August 29, 2010
|
{
"text": [
"Aniello Cimitile"
]
}
|
L2_Q16134_P6_1
|
Antonio Di Maria is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Oct, 2018 to Dec, 2022.
Aniello Cimitile is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 2008 to Jan, 2014.
Carmine Nardone is the head of the government of Benevento Province from Jan, 1998 to Jan, 2008.
|
Province of BeneventoThe Province of Benevento () is a province in the Campania region of Italy. Its capital is the city of Benevento.The province has an area of 2,071 km, and, , a total population of 279,308. There are 78 "comuni" in the province (for the full list, see comuni of the Province of Benevento). The biggest municipalities, the only ones over 10,000 inhabitants, are Benevento, Montesarchio, Sant'Agata de' Goti and San Giorgio del Sannio.The territory of the province of Benevento closely approximates that of the Principality of Benevento in the mid and late eleventh century. It borders Molise (province of Campobasso) on the North, Apulia (province of Foggia) on the East, the province of Avellino and the metropolitan City of Naples on the South, and the province of Caserta on the West.The lowest point is in the comune of Limatola (44 meters above sea level), while the highest point is Monte Mutria (1822 meters), one of the mountains of the Matese range, which separates the province of Benevento from Molise.
|
[
"Antonio Di Maria",
"Carmine Nardone"
] |
|
Which team did Jason Price play for in Oct, 2003?
|
October 13, 2003
|
{
"text": [
"Hull City A.F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q6163292_P54_3
|
Jason Price plays for Oldham Athletic A.F.C. from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2010.
Jason Price plays for Prestatyn Town F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2013.
Jason Price plays for Morecambe F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2012.
Jason Price plays for Doncaster Rovers F.C. from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2009.
Jason Price plays for Bradford City A.F.C. from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Hull City A.F.C. from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2006.
Jason Price plays for Swansea City A.F.C. from Jan, 1995 to Jan, 2001.
Jason Price plays for Walsall F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Brighouse Town F.C. from Jan, 2014 to Dec, 2022.
Jason Price plays for Ossett Town F.C. from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2013.
Jason Price plays for Hereford United F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Barnet F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Shaw Lane Aquaforce F.C. from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2014.
Jason Price plays for Guiseley A.F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2012.
Jason Price plays for Brentford F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2001.
Jason Price plays for Millwall F.C. from Jan, 2009 to Jan, 2010.
Jason Price plays for Carlisle United F.C. from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Tranmere Rovers F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2003.
Jason Price plays for Selby Town F.C. from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2013.
|
Jason PriceJason Jeffrey Price (born 12 April 1977 in Pontypridd) is a Welsh footballer. He can play as a right sided midfielder or as a forwardPrice had spells with Swansea City, Brentford (for whom he scored once against Reading), Tranmere Rovers and Hull City.He signed for Doncaster Rovers under former Rovers manager David Penney, and soon established himself as a key player under Sean O'Driscoll.On the return to his home country for the Football League Trophy Final at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff on 1 April 2007, Price suffered a snapped Achilles tendon ruling him out for nine months. He renewed his contract at Doncaster in June 2008 when his previous deal was due to expire. Despite much talk of him leaving Rovers, Price took up a new one-year deal.One of Price's most important goals was against Aston Villa in the 2008–09 FA Cup fourth round replay at Villa Park, when he poked in a cross from James Coppinger just before half-time.He joined Millwall on loan on 26 March 2009 for the remainder of the season, and two days later he scored on his Millwall debut – a 90th-minute winner which earned the Lions a crucial 1–0 victory at Crewe Alexandra.Price returned to Doncaster at the end of the season but was released from his contract on 7 May.On 7 July 2009 Price signed for Millwall on a one-year deal. He joined Oldham Athletic on a one-month loan deal on 1 February 2010, making seven appearances and scoring once against Swindon Town before returning to Millwall. Two days after his return, Price left the club on loan for a second time, joining Carlisle United until the end of the 2009–10 season. Price managed to score his first goal for the Cumbrians on his debut as Carlisle won the match 2–1 against Colchester.On 17 June 2010 Price signed a 1-year deal with Carlisle United. On 13 October 2010 he signed a one-month loan deal with Bradford City. His loan was extended to the start of January 2011, with Price scoring his first goal in his eighth game with the club, in a 1–1 draw with Accrington Stanley. On 28 January 2011 Price signed a one-month loan deal with Walsall who, at the time, were bottom of Football League One. Price made his debut at home the following day in a 6–1 victory over Bristol Rovers, the club's best league result since 1986 (which was a 6–0 victory, also over Bristol Rovers). On 24 March 2011 Price signed a loan deal with Hereford United until the end of the season.He was released by Carlisle United in May 2011 before signing an initial one-month deal with Barnet in League 2 in August 2011.On 2 August 2011, Price signed for Barnet on a one-month deal. He made his debut in a 1–0 win away to Morecambe and scored on his home debut in a 3–1 defeat against Port Vale.On 3 September 2011, Price signed for Morecambe on a four-month deal. He made his full debut at home in Morecambe's 6–0 hammering over Crawley Town on 10 September 2011.Price was released by Morecambe on 15 March 2012 to enable him to join Guiseley for the rest of the season.In August 2012, Price joined Welsh Premier League side Prestatyn Town and made his debut on the opening day of the season in a 4–2 victory over Afan Lido. Price made a great start to life in the Welsh premier league scoring several goals and winning player of the month for September. Price scored two goals to help Prestatyn win the Welsh cup final in a 3–1 extra time victory over Bangor City.In the 2013–14 season, Price had spells with Ossett Town, Selby Town, Shaw Lane Aquaforce and Brighouse Town. In August 2016, Price signed for Almondbury Woolpack of the Huddersfield and District League. On 30 August 2016 he scored two goals in his first game against Flockton FC, in which Woolpack went on to win 7–0. He also assisted four goals in that game.Price was capped by WALES u21 level.Swansea CityHull CityDoncaster RoversPrestatyn Town2016 Seniors World Cup Winner with England
|
[
"Brentford F.C.",
"Guiseley A.F.C.",
"Doncaster Rovers F.C.",
"Millwall F.C.",
"Tranmere Rovers F.C.",
"Walsall F.C.",
"Brighouse Town F.C.",
"Carlisle United F.C.",
"Shaw Lane Aquaforce F.C.",
"Selby Town F.C.",
"Swansea City A.F.C.",
"Morecambe F.C.",
"Hereford United F.C.",
"Oldham Athletic A.F.C.",
"Barnet F.C.",
"Bradford City A.F.C.",
"Prestatyn Town F.C.",
"Ossett Town F.C."
] |
|
Which team did Jason Price play for in 2003-10-13?
|
October 13, 2003
|
{
"text": [
"Hull City A.F.C."
]
}
|
L2_Q6163292_P54_3
|
Jason Price plays for Oldham Athletic A.F.C. from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2010.
Jason Price plays for Prestatyn Town F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2013.
Jason Price plays for Morecambe F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2012.
Jason Price plays for Doncaster Rovers F.C. from Jan, 2006 to Jan, 2009.
Jason Price plays for Bradford City A.F.C. from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Hull City A.F.C. from Jan, 2003 to Jan, 2006.
Jason Price plays for Swansea City A.F.C. from Jan, 1995 to Jan, 2001.
Jason Price plays for Walsall F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Brighouse Town F.C. from Jan, 2014 to Dec, 2022.
Jason Price plays for Ossett Town F.C. from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2013.
Jason Price plays for Hereford United F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Barnet F.C. from Jan, 2011 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Shaw Lane Aquaforce F.C. from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2014.
Jason Price plays for Guiseley A.F.C. from Jan, 2012 to Jan, 2012.
Jason Price plays for Brentford F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2001.
Jason Price plays for Millwall F.C. from Jan, 2009 to Jan, 2010.
Jason Price plays for Carlisle United F.C. from Jan, 2010 to Jan, 2011.
Jason Price plays for Tranmere Rovers F.C. from Jan, 2001 to Jan, 2003.
Jason Price plays for Selby Town F.C. from Jan, 2013 to Jan, 2013.
|
Jason PriceJason Jeffrey Price (born 12 April 1977 in Pontypridd) is a Welsh footballer. He can play as a right sided midfielder or as a forwardPrice had spells with Swansea City, Brentford (for whom he scored once against Reading), Tranmere Rovers and Hull City.He signed for Doncaster Rovers under former Rovers manager David Penney, and soon established himself as a key player under Sean O'Driscoll.On the return to his home country for the Football League Trophy Final at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff on 1 April 2007, Price suffered a snapped Achilles tendon ruling him out for nine months. He renewed his contract at Doncaster in June 2008 when his previous deal was due to expire. Despite much talk of him leaving Rovers, Price took up a new one-year deal.One of Price's most important goals was against Aston Villa in the 2008–09 FA Cup fourth round replay at Villa Park, when he poked in a cross from James Coppinger just before half-time.He joined Millwall on loan on 26 March 2009 for the remainder of the season, and two days later he scored on his Millwall debut – a 90th-minute winner which earned the Lions a crucial 1–0 victory at Crewe Alexandra.Price returned to Doncaster at the end of the season but was released from his contract on 7 May.On 7 July 2009 Price signed for Millwall on a one-year deal. He joined Oldham Athletic on a one-month loan deal on 1 February 2010, making seven appearances and scoring once against Swindon Town before returning to Millwall. Two days after his return, Price left the club on loan for a second time, joining Carlisle United until the end of the 2009–10 season. Price managed to score his first goal for the Cumbrians on his debut as Carlisle won the match 2–1 against Colchester.On 17 June 2010 Price signed a 1-year deal with Carlisle United. On 13 October 2010 he signed a one-month loan deal with Bradford City. His loan was extended to the start of January 2011, with Price scoring his first goal in his eighth game with the club, in a 1–1 draw with Accrington Stanley. On 28 January 2011 Price signed a one-month loan deal with Walsall who, at the time, were bottom of Football League One. Price made his debut at home the following day in a 6–1 victory over Bristol Rovers, the club's best league result since 1986 (which was a 6–0 victory, also over Bristol Rovers). On 24 March 2011 Price signed a loan deal with Hereford United until the end of the season.He was released by Carlisle United in May 2011 before signing an initial one-month deal with Barnet in League 2 in August 2011.On 2 August 2011, Price signed for Barnet on a one-month deal. He made his debut in a 1–0 win away to Morecambe and scored on his home debut in a 3–1 defeat against Port Vale.On 3 September 2011, Price signed for Morecambe on a four-month deal. He made his full debut at home in Morecambe's 6–0 hammering over Crawley Town on 10 September 2011.Price was released by Morecambe on 15 March 2012 to enable him to join Guiseley for the rest of the season.In August 2012, Price joined Welsh Premier League side Prestatyn Town and made his debut on the opening day of the season in a 4–2 victory over Afan Lido. Price made a great start to life in the Welsh premier league scoring several goals and winning player of the month for September. Price scored two goals to help Prestatyn win the Welsh cup final in a 3–1 extra time victory over Bangor City.In the 2013–14 season, Price had spells with Ossett Town, Selby Town, Shaw Lane Aquaforce and Brighouse Town. In August 2016, Price signed for Almondbury Woolpack of the Huddersfield and District League. On 30 August 2016 he scored two goals in his first game against Flockton FC, in which Woolpack went on to win 7–0. He also assisted four goals in that game.Price was capped by WALES u21 level.Swansea CityHull CityDoncaster RoversPrestatyn Town2016 Seniors World Cup Winner with England
|
[
"Brentford F.C.",
"Guiseley A.F.C.",
"Doncaster Rovers F.C.",
"Millwall F.C.",
"Tranmere Rovers F.C.",
"Walsall F.C.",
"Brighouse Town F.C.",
"Carlisle United F.C.",
"Shaw Lane Aquaforce F.C.",
"Selby Town F.C.",
"Swansea City A.F.C.",
"Morecambe F.C.",
"Hereford United F.C.",
"Oldham Athletic A.F.C.",
"Barnet F.C.",
"Bradford City A.F.C.",
"Prestatyn Town F.C.",
"Ossett Town F.C."
] |
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.