Mikhail Gorbachev, after assuming power in 1985, had a vision that contradicted the communist foundations on which the Union was built since its founding, but he could not implement his visions as he wanted, so he faced major economic problems and nationalist turmoil in various Soviet republics spurred by decisive global events, such as the collapse of the Berlin Wall and the exit of the Soviet Union. Eastern European countries from the mantle of communism.
What are the reasons that led to the fall of the Soviet Union?
How did Gorbachev act?
And what are the consequences that followed the collapse of one of the two poles that led the world for decades and divided it into what was known as the Western camp (led by the United States of America) and the Eastern camp (led by the Soviet Union)?
Before the crisis
During the dictatorship of Joseph Stalin, the Soviet Union abolished the private sector completely and imposed communism in its regions. His period witnessed what his opponents considered "ethnic cleansing" in many regions, including areas inhabited by Muslims such as the Caucasus, Turkestan and Tatarstan.
In World War II, the Soviet Union entered a war with Germany, and emerged victorious but exhausted, losing more than 10% of its population and 70% of its industrial facilities, and its buildings and infrastructure witnessed massive destruction.
Despite the good relations that began during the Second World War with America and Britain after the Yalta Conference in February 1945, they quickly turned into a cold war and a violent nuclear arms race, then what was known as the “Warsaw Pact”, which included the Soviet Union and the socialist republics in 1955, That is, a year after the formation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the Union also tried to impose its control over Eastern Europe and establish communist regimes in it.
From 1953 to 1985, the Soviet Union went through important stages, it became a parallel pole to America, and entered into a party to the Cuban missile crisis in 1962 (which was about to plunge the world into a global nuclear war).
After that, the influence of the Soviet Union increased in Africa and Latin America, and the Soviets invaded Afghanistan at the end of 1979, and the area of the Union extended until it seized one-sixth of the land area, but despite that, the country had not yet recovered from Stalin's policies that brought it into economic stagnation.
Gorbachev's policy, the last president of the Soviet Union
Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in 1985, and found the country suffering from severe economic crises, so he pursued what he called a policy of "glasnos", meaning openness and transparency in the country's administration, and presented a plan to reform the situation, which he called "perestroika", which means rebuilding.
The Perestroika plan was based on the principle of democracy and human rights, giving people freedom of opinion and expression, stopping arrests and releasing hundreds of politicians. After that, economic studies were launched that analyzed the economic performance of the socialist system and revealed its problems, and its attempt to transform into a market economy.
At the level of foreign policy, Gorbachev tried to improve his country's relations with Western capitalist countries, limiting armaments and signing several agreements to get rid of medium-range nuclear missiles, as well as reducing his conventional forces in Eastern Europe.
During 1988-1989, he ordered the withdrawal of all Soviet forces from Afghanistan, and announced on December 7, 1988 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, the end of what was known as the Cold War between the eastern and western camps.
But Gorbachev did not reach his desired goals, as he faced major economic problems, and the situation in the country was exacerbated by the disaster of the Chernobyl nuclear reactor, which exploded on April 26, 1986, causing material and human losses, and a political crisis followed.
Coup "support" to opposition
There was strong opposition to Gorbachev's "perestroika" plan, and he began to get rid of members of the opposition Congress of Deputies, and the police proceeded to intercept unauthorized demonstrations that opposed his policies.
In the first session of the Congress of Deputies, Gorbachev prevented any decisions from being taken in the complaints submitted by the deputies about the state of the country after Stalin's rule, which centered on the extreme poverty that the country suffered from, the lack of consumer goods, the abuse of minorities, the anti-demonstration laws, etc., and soon demonstrations and labor strikes began , which intensified in 1989.
The straw of minorities that exacerbated the situation
The deterioration of the internal conditions of the country was accompanied by a growing sense of “nationalism” among some minorities in the Soviet Union in several republics, including Azerbaijan, Armenia, Estonia and Lithuania, where minorities demanded secession after years of “persecution and forced cultural change in language and identity.”
Gorbachev tried to confront the secession movements and confronted their demonstrations by force, but the fuse for nationalist demands was ignited in the Nagorno-Karabakh region and in the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) and the Caucasus, all of which demanded independence and secession.
The republics of those regions declared the independence of their Communist Party from the Communist Party in Moscow, after which a series of declarations of secession and independence from the Soviet Union began by other regions, including Georgia, Moldova, Estonia, Belarus and Western Ukraine.
Gorbachev's government fell into internal problems due to the division of state institutions between supporters and opponents of the government's policies, in addition to the escalation of demands for secession.
Simultaneously and outside the borders of the Union, world events changed history, such as the collapse of the Berlin Wall, the loss of East Berlin by the Union, and the exit of Eastern European countries from the mantle of communism, causing increased pressure on Gorbachev from all sides.
The coup against Gorbachev
While Gorbachev was on vacation in the Crimea, the communists opposed to "perestroika" took advantage of his absence to declare a military coup against him on August 19, 1991, forming the "State Emergency Committee" with the aim of "save the country from collapse."
The Communists declared in the official state media that Mikhail Gorbachev was "unable to take up his duties for health reasons", and appointed Gennady Yanayev as Vice-President, leading the State Emergency Committee and entrusting themselves with all the powers.
The President of the Russian Federation, Boris Yeltsin, confronted the "coup movement" from the first hour of its announcement, as he entered Moscow with armored vehicles, called for a general strike and civil disobedience, and was supported by 3 military units, and raised the flag of the Russian Federation.
Simultaneously with the crowd in front of the Russian parliament, a group of supportive deputies toured the military barracks in Moscow to persuade the officers to support Yeltsin, and managed to gather more than 50,000 people in front of the parliament in addition to the former Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze.
On August 21, 1991, parliament announced that Gorbachev had been brought from his country house, the Ministry of Defense ordered troops to return to their barracks, military measures were eased, censorship and curfews were lifted, and the "coup ceremonies" were cancelled.
On the night of the announcement, Gorbachev returned to the Kremlin, but he had lost his power, his collaborators either betrayed him or abandoned him, his party weakened, and Boris Yeltsin became the real power in the country.
the end
Gorbachev submitted his resignation from the presidency of the Communist Party on August 25, 1991, and the flag of the Soviet Union was lowered from the Kremlin in Moscow, and the flag of Russia was raised in its place, and the Soviet Parliament voted on August 29, 1991 to stop the work of the Communist Party and close its headquarters.
On December 8, 1991, the "Belovezhsk" Agreement (the agreement establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States) was signed between Russia and 11 countries including Ukraine and Belarus (excluding the Baltic states and Georgia) as an alternative to the union.
The CIS countries agreed that the Soviet Union "no longer exists" after the signing of the agreement to end its existence, and within two months after the declaration of the dissolution of the Union, all Soviet republics had declared their independence.
On December 25, 1991, the end of the Soviet Union was officially announced, the independence of the Soviet republics recognized, and a new historical era began in the region and the world.
After the disintegration
On December 26, 1991, recognition of the Soviet republics was announced.
After the disintegration, 15 countries emerged, including the Russian Federation, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus.
4 countries inherited the Soviet nuclear arsenal, the most important of which are Russia, in addition to Ukraine and Belarus.
The area of the Union shrank by 24%, while it was occupying 22.4 million square kilometers, its area after the disintegration became only 17 million square kilometers.
Boris Yeltsin was elected Russia's first president, remaining in power until December 1999.
Russia suffered severe economic problems in the 1990s, exacerbated by the Chechen War.