Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia: The History and Legacy of the Multiethnic Nations that Split Apart after the Cold War

On New Year's Day 1993, Czechoslovakia broke into two separate countries, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Thus ended one of the creations brought about by the Treaty of Versailles after World War I, and as a country that had existed for just under 75 years, Czechoslovakia spent most of its time under the tyranny of fascism or communism.

Of course, the country's origins go back far longer than the 1910s, and they were complex and convoluted. The very geography of central Europe meant this...