The Soviet Bloc refers to a group of Eastern European countries that were aligned with the Soviet Union during the Cold War. This alliance included nations like Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, East Germany, and Romania. These countries were influenced by communist ideology and were part of the Warsaw Pact, a military alliance formed in 1955 as a counterbalance to NATO. The Soviet Bloc was characterized by centralized economies and one-party political systems. The Soviet Union exerted significant control over these nations, often intervening in their domestic affairs. The Bloc began to dissolve in the late 1980s, leading to the fall of communism in many of these countries and the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.