okay it's time to talk about decolonization and if you my friend are ready to hear all about how European Empires fell apart after World War II then this is the video for you so I think it's high time we got them bringing cows milked let's get to it so hopefully if you've made it this far in the AP European History curriculum you know by now that European Empire building has been a major theme that runs from the beginning of this course all the way through the end of dang near every European State at one time or another has looked at the rest of the world and was like I'll take that and that and that but after World War II we're gonna see how this centuries-long project of European Empire falls apart and the name for it is decolonization really it started after World War One thanks to American President Woodrow Wilson remember that one of his big pushes during this peace process was the encouragement of self-determination for all the States involved and all the states around the world what this means is that any given people should have the right to determine their own political structure like should be able to choose their own government without the interference of European Imperial powers and look I myself am no fan of worldwide Imperial domination but I am a fan of you positively dominating your AP exam in May and if you do too then check out my AP Euro review pack which is linked down in the description anyway while old Woodrow was waxing eloquent about self-determination at Versailles everyone in India and Algeria and South Africa and dang near every colonized people in the world were like uh yes please and you know add in the fact that European Empires have called up colonial soldiers to fight in World War One and the calls for Independence grew even louder but old Imperial habits are hard to break and once push came to shove European Imperial Powers were reluctant to give up their vast Empire I think came along World War II and again Colonial soldiers fought in their Imperial parents War but this time once the war was over major Imperial Powers no longer had the wealth or military power to quell the rising demands for Independence around the world and thus began the process of decolonization which happened over the span of decades I'd like to tell you that decolonization happened easily once European powers decided that they can no longer hold on to their Empires but then I'd be lying to you in some cases it did happen quickly and quietly but in other cases you know Europeans be Europeans and their reluctance to let go of their colonies meant that a war was fought so let's consider how the process took place first in Africa and then in Asia now remember that European powers had carved up Africa like their little play thing during the second wave of imperialism and this became known as the Scramble for Africa in the 19th century after World War II indigenous nationalist movements sprang up demanding Independence in Algeria for example which had been a French Colony things got uh tense you see France had already recognized the independence of two of its colonies Morocco and Tunisia but they also had Algeria under their thumb as well but the French didn't want to Grant Algeria Independence because the problem in Algeria is that almost a million French citizens had migrated to Algeria and settled there so in response to this reluctance in the 1950s a nationalist Muslim group called the National Liberation Front began rebelling against their colonizers and so to protect French citizens living in Algeria along with hundreds of thousands of other white Europeans France sent troops to crush the Rebellion which you know they did but it instigated a bloody eight-year Civil War and it came to an end with the return of Charles de Gaulle who became the French president in 1958 he recognized algeria's right to self-determination and officially recognized their independence now something similar was going on over in Egypt which had been a British colony now technically Egypt became independent in 1922 after World War one but the British engineered the independent so they were basically still in charge therefore a nationalist political party was formed in Egypt called the waft which began campaigning for full Egyptian independence now the problem was that the waft weren't big fans of the Egyptian Monarch either and so 1952 the Egyptian Army led a coup to overthrow the Monarch and officially throw off British intrusion in their state okay now let's head over to Asia and see how the decolonization process was going over there and we'll start in India by 1920 Mohandas Gandhi led the Indian National Congress in the movement for Indian independence from Britain and Gandhi's chosen means of leadership to this end was non-violent Civil Disobedience the British were essentially exhausted and broke from fighting World War II and in light of all this resistance from Indians they realized they simply didn't have the resources or the power to maintain colonial rule in India and so in 1947 India through negotiation with Britain became an independent nation now remember that all this is going on right smack in the middle of the Cold War so as these nations are gaining their independence both the United States and the Soviet Union came knocking on their doors to persuade them to join one side out of the other now India resisted both powers and remained independent of the struggle and thus paved the way for what became known as the non-aligned movement which several other newly independent nations would also take but for other states fighting for their independence remaining non-aligned was more difficult for example in Indonesia which had gained its independence from the Dutch in 1949 the Soviets made significant inroads the president of Indonesia a guy by the name of sukarno was a socialist and he gladly accepted support for his policies from the Soviet Union and communist China however an Indonesian nationalist movement formed during his tenure mostly comprised of the military and conservative Muslims and they overthrew sicarno in 1965 and then established a new government and aligned themselves with the west and finally the world witnessed a similar struggle as Vietnam sought its independence from France in the 1950s a Vietnamese nationalist leader named Ho Chi Minh organized a resistance group called The vietmen whose goal was to overthrow the French the Vietnam won a decisive battle against the French in 1954 and so the French divided Vietnam into two in order to prepare them for elections in Independence in 1956. the north became dominated by communist sympathies while the South was more loyal to Western power and if you remember from Unit 8 the Soviet Union and the United States ended up fighting a proxy war here that ultimately ended in however after all was said and done Vietnam gained its independence in 1975. Okay click here to keep reviewing unit 9 of AP Europe and since you have that National exam breathing down your neck you can click here and grab my AP Euro review pack which is everything you need to get an A in your class and a five on your examine I'll catch on the flip-flop I'm Laurent