How extensive was USSR control in Warsaw pact countries?

Question by NC: How extensive was Soviet control in Warsaw pact countries?
I watched a movie about the Berlin wall in class today, and it seemed like all of the decisions regarding the governance of East Germany came directly form Moscow (like Reagan asking Gorbachev,not the president of East Germany to tear the wall down). How much control did the Soviet Union have on countries like Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, etc.? Were they essentially Soviet provinces, and just nominally independent? Or were they really independent?

Answers and Views:

Answer by Spellbound
Soviet control varied from country to country, and fit also varied over time. In the aftermath of WWII, Soviet control was absolute, they installed the governments, and dictated exactly what policies to follow. But after time, especially after the death of Stalin in 1953, they were able to forge their own paths to socialism, they were fully independent.
In Romania, from about 1965, when Ceausescu took office, the Soviets had little control over what went on, Romania publicly opposed the 1968 invasion of Prague. Whilst in East Germany, throughout the period, or Czechoslovakia (after 1968), they exercised considerable amounts of control.
The interesting countries, I think, are Poland and Hungary who, for different reasons, were able to forge their own versions of socialism by the mid to late 1980s. Poland was able to because of its strong Catholic identity that the Soviets knew they could never break, so only sporadically tried, and because Polish agriculture was never fully collectivised – so Polish agriculture retained a distinct national identity.
Hungary were able to because they were to develop their ideas without threatening to break away from the Warsaw Pact – which is what had triggered the 1956 invasion.

BTW – Reagan asking for the wall to come down was not the reason it was torn down, that was due to the Sinatra Doctrine formulated by Gorbachev, and also down to the East German people’s courage and determination to see an end to the artificial barrier dividing the country.

See:
Patrick Brogan – The Captive Nations 1945 – 1991 for a simplified, but very good, account of all the histories of the Eastern Bloc countries under communism.

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