In the cafe of Vienna's Sacher Hotel, waiters serve coffee with cream and slices of the famous Sachertorte to visitors from around the world, continuing a tradition which began over a century ago. Back then the hotel had newly opened in the heart of a vat empire which included all or parts of what are now Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, the Ukraine, Rumania, Yugoslavia and Italy. Today, many of these nations were again calling for independence from a distant, oppressive regime. Whereas the collapse of the Austrian Empire in 1914 catapulted the world into the Great War, these recent events held the promise of a delicate, though lasting peace.

It was more than a decade since the collapse of the Berlin Wall had sent tremors of reform across Eastern Europe. Czechs were out in the streets of Prague, demanding the resignation of their hard-line leaders. Free elections would be held there in the coming weeks. Six months earlier, Hungary had been the first of the Soviet satellite nations to open to the West. Further east in Rumania, the citizens of Bucharest were preparing to put an end to Ceausescu's reign of madness. Virtually overnight, the Iron Curtain had become a tattered veil.

"Here we are in the middle of East and West", said J.J. Szalanski, the young Managing Director of the Sacher Hotel. "While we are considered part of the West, we have more in common with Budapest or Prague. At the moment they are communist cities, but in two years' time or even sooner, who knows? Maybe not.