Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact
A secret protocol splits Eastern Europe into spheres of influence
On 23 August 1939 the USSR and Germany signed a non-aggression pact with a secret protocol dividing Eastern Europe into spheres of influence. Germany invaded Poland on 1 September; Soviet troops entered its eastern regions on 17 September.
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Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Whole world
- 1918–1920 Spanish flu pandemic — 21 years earlier
- 1939–1945 World War II — same year
- 1947–1991 Cold War — 8 years later
- 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights — 9 years later
- 1949 Founding of NATO — 10 years later
Europe
- 1928 Discovery of penicillin — 11 years earlier
- 1933 Hitler comes to power — 6 years earlier
- 1936–1939 Spanish Civil War — 3 years earlier
- 1941–1945 The Holocaust — 2 years later
- 1953 Discovery of the DNA double helix — 14 years later
Middle East
- 1915 Armenian genocide — 24 years earlier
- 1916 Sykes–Picot Agreement — 23 years earlier
- 1916–1918 The Arab Revolt — 23 years earlier
- 1932 Kingdom of Saudi Arabia proclaimed — 7 years earlier
- 1948 Founding of the State of Israel — 9 years later
Africa
- 1922 Discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb — 17 years earlier
- 1935–1937 Italy invades Ethiopia — 4 years earlier
- 1956 The Suez Crisis — 17 years later
- 1958 Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart — 19 years later
- 1960 Year of Africa — 21 years later
Asia
- 1931 China floods — 8 years earlier
- 1934–1935 Long March — 5 years earlier
- 1945 Atomic bombing of Hiroshima — 6 years later
- 1945 Indonesia proclaims independence — 6 years later
- 1953 First ascent of Everest — 14 years later
Americas
- 1914 Opening of the Panama Canal — 25 years earlier
- 1929 Wall Street Crash and the Great Depression — 10 years earlier
- c. 1930–1936 Dust Bowl — 9 years earlier
- 1945 ENIAC, the first general-purpose electronic computer — 6 years later
- 1947 Invention of the transistor — 8 years later
Oceania
- 1936 Death of the last thylacine — 3 years earlier
- 1941 Attack on Pearl Harbor — 2 years later
- 1942 The Battle of Midway — 3 years later
- 1954 The Castle Bravo test at Bikini — 15 years later
- 1959 The Antarctic Treaty — 20 years later
Alive at the time
- Nikola Tesla (aged 83)
- Mahatma Gandhi (aged 70)
- Winston Churchill (aged 65)
- Joseph Stalin (aged 61)
- Albert Einstein (aged 60)
- Pablo Picasso (aged 58)
- Adolf Hitler (aged 50)
- Charlie Chaplin (aged 50)
- Mao Zedong (aged 46)
- Nelson Mandela (aged 21)