Geographical Regions of Europe: The Eastern Crush Zone

Two major lowland corridors cross eastern Europe: the northern plain, within which virtually the entire territory of Poland lies, and the Danube Valley, which is shared by Hungary, Croatia, Yugoslavia, and Romania. Between them lie the low mountains and plateaus of Bohemia and Moravia and the higher alpine peaks of the Tatra in Slovakia, as well as the arc of the Carpathians and the Transylvanian Alps in Romania. South of the Danube are the mountain cores of Yugoslavia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Albania, and Bulgaria. The first four countries lie amid the Dinaric Alps, and the last is traversed by the Balkan and Rhodope ranges. Bulgaria's principal lowland area is the valley of the Maritsa River, which opens southeastward toward Turkey and the Aegean Sea.

The climate of the east is continental, with cold snowy winters and warm humid summers. There is precipitation at all seasons, but it is insufficient to support a forest cover in the lower plains areas of Hungary and Romania. In these areas the westernmost outliers of the Eurasian steppes are found. Elsewhere the native vegetation is broadleaf deciduous forest, while in the higher mountains there are considerable stands of conifers. Soils show a similar transition from the fertile chernozems, or black earths, of the Danube Valley, through the gray-brown podzols of the Czech and Slovak republics and much of the Balkans, to the ashy gray podzols typical of the once glaciated parts of Poland.

The region's agriculture reflects these differences in climate and soil, ranging from an emphasis on rye, potatoes, and hay in Poland to corn, wheat, and grapes in the Danube Valley and to more exotic subtropical crops such as citrus, tobacco, cotton, and rice along the Croatian coast and in Bulgaria. Despite the post–World War II emphasis on industrialization by the Communist planners, farming still employs the greatest number of people within much of the region. Farming is neither so intensive nor so efficient as in western and central Europe but technically more advanced than in most of southern Europe.

As a result of the postwar boundary changes, Poland gained the Silesian coalfields—the third-largest deposit of high-grade bituminous coal on the continent. The former republics of Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia as well as Romania all have small deposits of both coal and iron ore. Romania also has reserves of petroleum, while Hungary and Yugoslavia both have substantial deposits of bauxite as well. By coordinating these resources with those of the Soviet Union, the east European countries made impressive progress in industrialization in the decades following World War II.

Budapest and Bucharest are the region's largest metropolises, both with more than 2 million inhabitants. Four other capitals—Warsaw, Prague, Belgrade, and Sofia—have populations of more than 1 million each.