1. Heroes and Villains of the Globalization Era: The Soviet Union Collapses and the Post-Cold War World Begins

My Name is Mikhail Gorbachev: President of the Soviet Union

I was born in 1931 in the village of Privolnoye in southern Russia. My family lived close to the soil, working on collective farms during some of the Soviet Union's hardest years. I witnessed hunger, government repression, and then the terrible destruction of the Second World War. German forces occupied our region for several months. These experiences taught me that great political ideas mean little if ordinary people cannot live with dignity, security, and hope.

Rising Through the Communist Party

As a young man, I worked alongside my father operating agricultural machinery before studying law at Moscow State University. I joined the Communist Party and gradually rose through its ranks. I believed in socialism, but I also saw its weaknesses. Agriculture struggled, factories were inefficient, officials sometimes hid failures, and bureaucracy could become more concerned with protecting itself than solving problems. By the time I became General Secretary of the Communist Party in March 1985, I understood that the Soviet Union could not simply continue as it had.

Perestroika: Restructuring the Soviet Union

I called for perestroika, or restructuring. I did not intend to destroy the Soviet system. I intended to modernize it. Our economy needed greater efficiency and initiative, while our government needed officials willing to accept responsibility. I believed socialism could survive only if it could change. Yet reforming such an enormous system proved far more difficult than issuing orders from Moscow. Every change affected another part of the system, and resistance came from officials who feared losing their positions and privileges.

Glasnost: Speaking More Openly

Alongside restructuring came glasnost, or openness. Soviet citizens needed greater freedom to discuss their country's problems. Newspapers began publishing subjects that had once been forbidden. People debated Stalin's crimes, government corruption, economic failures, and Soviet history. I believed that we could not correct mistakes if we were afraid to acknowledge them. But openness had consequences even I could not completely control. Once people discovered that they could question government decisions, many began questioning the Soviet political system itself.

Changing the Cold War

I also believed that the endless confrontation with the United States was draining both sides. Nuclear war could produce no meaningful victory. I met repeatedly with American leaders, particularly President Ronald Reagan and later President George H. W. Bush. We negotiated arms reductions and sought a different relationship between our countries. When Communist governments began falling across Eastern Europe in 1989, I refused to respond with the kind of massive Soviet military intervention used by earlier leaders. The Cold War order that had divided Europe for decades began disappearing.

The Union Begins to Break Apart

The greatest danger eventually came from within the Soviet Union itself. Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Ukraine, Georgia, and other Soviet republics increasingly demanded sovereignty or independence. At the same time, Boris Yeltsin emerged as a powerful rival within Russia. I tried to create a new union agreement that would give the republics greater independence while preserving a common Soviet state. I was attempting to reform the Union while holding it together, but political events were moving faster than my government could manage.

The August Coup

In August 1991, Communist hardliners attempted to seize power. While I was at my residence in Crimea, they isolated me and announced that I could no longer perform my duties. They believed my reforms were destroying the Soviet Union. The coup collapsed within days as resistance grew in Moscow, where Yeltsin became its most visible opponent. I returned to Moscow as president, but the country I returned to was profoundly different. The Communist Party's authority had collapsed, the republics accelerated their independence movements, and my own power was rapidly disappearing.

The Final Days of the Soviet Union

In December 1991, the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus agreed that the Soviet Union would cease to exist and announced the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States. On December 25, I resigned as President of the Soviet Union. That evening, I addressed the people for the final time as their president. Soon afterward, the Soviet flag was lowered over the Kremlin. A state that had existed for nearly seventy years had come to an end.

Superpower in Trouble: The Soviet Economy in the Late 1980s - Told by Gorbachev

When I became General Secretary of the Communist Party in March 1985, outsiders saw a Soviet Union that appeared immensely powerful. We possessed nuclear weapons, enormous armed forces, a vast territory stretching across eleven time zones, and influence reaching far beyond our borders. But from inside the Kremlin, I could see something more troubling. Our military strength concealed serious weaknesses in our economy and society. The Soviet Union could send spacecraft into orbit and manufacture missiles, yet ordinary citizens could wait in long lines for meat, shoes, household goods, and other everyday products. We were a superpower, but we were becoming a superpower that struggled to provide efficiently for its own people.

An Economy That Had Lost Its Energy

For decades, our economy had operated through central planning. Government ministries decided what factories should produce, how much they should produce, and often where those products should go. This system had helped industrialize the Soviet Union rapidly, but by the 1970s and 1980s its weaknesses had become increasingly obvious. Managers were rewarded for meeting government production targets rather than satisfying consumers or improving quality. Competition was limited, innovation often moved slowly, and waste could be enormous. Economic growth had slowed substantially compared with earlier decades. I concluded that continuing exactly as before was no longer possible.

The Store Shelves Told the Story

Statistics written in government reports could be impressive, but ordinary people judged the economy differently. They looked at what was available in the stores. Shortages varied by place and product, but obtaining desirable food, clothing, appliances, and other consumer goods could require waiting, personal connections, or repeated searching. Citizens could have money in their pockets without finding the products they wanted to purchase. This created an uncomfortable contradiction: the state claimed remarkable economic achievements while families could see shortages with their own eyes.

Oil, Technology, and the Cost of Military Power

Our problems became harder during the 1980s. Oil and gas exports provided the Soviet Union with valuable foreign currency, so falling world oil prices in the middle of the decade hurt government revenues. Meanwhile, Western countries were advancing rapidly in computers, electronics, communications, and other technologies. We remained formidable in science, space exploration, and military engineering, but many civilian industries lagged behind. At the same time, maintaining our enormous military establishment and competing strategically with the United States demanded substantial resources. We could not indefinitely measure national strength by the number of weapons we possessed.

Chernobyl Exposes a Deeper Problem

Then came April 26, 1986. Reactor Number Four at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded. The disaster released radioactive material across a wide region and eventually required enormous containment and cleanup efforts. But Chernobyl revealed more than a technological failure. The initial Soviet response was marked by secrecy and delayed disclosure. Officials had been trained within a system in which admitting bad news could threaten careers. I increasingly understood that secrecy itself had become dangerous. A modern country could not solve its problems when people were afraid to report that problems existed.

Perestroika and Glasnost

My answer was reform. Perestroika meant restructuring the economy and political system. Glasnost meant greater openness in public discussion. I wanted enterprises to receive greater freedom, officials to become more accountable, and citizens to speak more openly about our failures. I believed these changes would strengthen socialism by removing the stagnation that had developed around it. But reform produced unexpected consequences. Old economic controls weakened before effective new institutions could replace them, contributing to disruption and worsening shortages in the final Soviet years. Meanwhile, glasnost allowed frustrations that had been suppressed for decades to burst into public view.

A Society Begins Asking Questions

Once Soviet citizens were permitted greater openness, they did not restrict themselves to discussing factory production. Newspapers and television programs examined Stalin's terror, corruption, environmental disasters, the war in Afghanistan, and other subjects that previously had been heavily restricted. People began asking why their history had been hidden from them. Religious activity became more open. Political groups formed. In Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, and elsewhere, national movements demanded greater control over their own affairs. Reform was no longer simply an economic program. It had awakened a political society.

The Dangerous Paradox of Reform

This was the great difficulty I faced. The Soviet Union desperately needed change, yet changing it threatened the institutions holding it together. If I stopped reform, stagnation would continue. If I pushed reform forward, I could not guarantee where it would lead. By the end of the 1980s, strikes, shortages, nationalist movements, political competition, and public criticism were increasingly visible. The Soviet government could no longer control information or political life as completely as it once had.

The Superpower Beneath the Surface

The Soviet Union did not collapse because of one president, one American policy, one economic statistic, or one protest. Its final crisis grew from many pressures that interacted: long-term economic weaknesses, political rigidity, technological challenges, costly international commitments, ethnic and national tensions, declining confidence in Communist institutions, and reforms that exposed problems faster than we could solve them. From outside, the Soviet Union still looked like one of the mightiest countries on Earth. From inside, however, the foundations were moving. And once millions of people realized that change was possible, the most important question was no longer whether the Soviet Union would change, but whether anyone could control what that change would become.

Glasnost & Perestroika Unleash Forces Moscow Can’t Control - Told by Gorbachev

When I became leader of the Soviet Union in 1985, I did not come to destroy the country or abandon socialism. I wanted to save a system that had become stagnant. Factories were inefficient, shortages frustrated families, bureaucracy slowed innovation, and too many officials were afraid to admit when something had gone wrong. I believed the Soviet Union needed two great changes: perestroika, meaning restructuring, and glasnost, meaning greater openness. What I could not fully foresee was what would happen once millions of people realized that Moscow was finally allowing them to speak.

Perestroika Changes the Rules

Perestroika was intended to make our economy and government work better. Soviet enterprises gradually received more independence, limited forms of private cooperative business were permitted, and political reforms reduced some of the Communist Party's old control. But changing a command economy was extraordinarily difficult. Old rules weakened while new market institutions remained incomplete. Production and distribution became increasingly disrupted, shortages worsened, and public frustration grew. Instead of immediately demonstrating the success of reform, perestroika often showed Soviet citizens just how deeply their economic problems reached.

Glasnost Breaks the Silence

Glasnost proved even more powerful. Newspapers, television programs, writers, historians, and ordinary citizens received greater freedom to discuss subjects that once could have brought punishment. People learned more about Stalin's purges, prison camps, government corruption, environmental disasters, and failures in Afghanistan. Previously banned or restricted writings appeared. Public debate became increasingly vigorous. My reasoning was straightforward: how could we correct our mistakes if we were forbidden to discuss them? But every truth revealed produced another question. If the government had concealed so much before, what else might the people question?

Elections Begin to Matter

Political reform soon followed. In 1989, elections were held for the new Congress of People's Deputies. Although the system was not yet a Western-style multiparty democracy, voters could choose among competing candidates in many districts, and prominent Communist officials sometimes lost. Televised sessions of the Congress exposed millions of Soviet citizens to arguments and criticism that would once have been unthinkable. Politics was becoming something people could participate in rather than merely something announced to them.

The Republics Remember Their Nations

Then another force gathered strength: nationalism. The Soviet Union contained fifteen union republics and many different peoples, languages, religions, and historical memories. In Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, mass movements demanded the restoration of national sovereignty. Demonstrations also appeared in Georgia, Armenia, Ukraine, and elsewhere. In August 1989, roughly two million people joined hands across Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania in the Baltic Way. Their message was unmistakable. Greater openness had allowed people to discuss not only how the Soviet Union should be governed, but whether their nations should remain inside it at all.

The Communist Party Loses Its Monopoly

The political changes accelerated in 1990. The constitutional guarantee of the Communist Party's leading role was removed, opening the way for greater political competition. Boris Yeltsin emerged as one of my strongest rivals and increasingly presented himself as a defender of Russian sovereignty and faster change. This created an extraordinary situation: the Soviet government in Moscow was losing authority while the government of Russia—the largest republic within the Soviet Union—was gaining it. Other republics watched closely and demanded powers of their own.

The Reformer's Dilemma

I now faced a contradiction that became more dangerous with every month. Using massive repression to restore the old order would contradict the reforms themselves and could produce bloodshed on a terrible scale. Yet allowing political freedom meant accepting that citizens might use that freedom to reject the Communist Party, challenge Moscow, or demand independence. I attempted to negotiate a new union that would give the republics greater sovereignty while preserving a common state. Hardliners believed I had already gone too far. Radicals believed I had not gone nearly far enough.

My Name is Vytautas Landsbergis: Lithuanian Independence Leader

I was born in Kaunas, Lithuania, in 1932. I entered a world in which Lithuania was an independent country, but that independence did not survive my childhood. The Soviet Union occupied Lithuania in 1940, Nazi Germany followed in 1941, and Soviet forces returned in 1944. I grew up understanding that Lithuania possessed its own language, culture, history, and national identity even when foreign powers attempted to determine our future.

Music, Culture, and Lithuanian Identity

Politics was not my first profession. I became a pianist, musicologist, teacher, and scholar, particularly studying the Lithuanian composer and artist Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis. Under Soviet rule, culture could carry meanings beyond entertainment. Music, literature, language, religion, and historical memory helped Lithuanians remember who they were. A nation does not exist only because governments recognize its borders. It also survives in the memories and traditions of its people.

A Movement Called Sąjūdis

During the reforms of Mikhail Gorbachev in the late 1980s, Soviet citizens received greater freedom to speak and organize. In Lithuania, we used that opening. In 1988, I became one of the leaders of Sąjūdis, the Lithuanian reform movement. At first, many demands concerned openness, environmental problems, language, and political reform. Soon the greater question could no longer be avoided: if Lithuania had been independent before Soviet occupation, why should we not restore that independence?

The Baltic Way

Lithuania was not alone. Estonia and Latvia shared much of our experience. On August 23, 1989, approximately two million people joined hands across the three Baltic republics, forming a human chain stretching hundreds of miles. It became known as the Baltic Way. We wanted Moscow and the world to see that our demand for freedom was not the ambition of a handful of politicians. Ordinary people were prepared to stand peacefully together and declare that history had not erased our nations.

Lithuania Declares Independence

In February 1990, Lithuania held competitive elections, and Sąjūdis won a commanding position. I became chairman of Lithuania's Supreme Council. On March 11, we adopted the Act of the Re-Establishment of the State of Lithuania. We did not describe ourselves as creating a new country. We declared that the independent Lithuanian state, whose sovereignty had been interrupted by Soviet occupation, was being restored. Moscow rejected our action and applied enormous political and economic pressure.

The Night of January 13

The confrontation became deadly in January 1991. Soviet troops moved against important buildings in Vilnius, including the television tower. Thousands of unarmed citizens gathered to defend Lithuania's institutions. Fourteen civilians were killed during the Soviet assault, and many more were injured. Yet Lithuania's government survived. Those civilians demonstrated something no tank could easily overcome: a population determined to defend its country's independence without surrendering its claim to freedom.

The Soviet Union Begins to Fall

During the failed Soviet coup of August 1991, we understood how dangerous the moment was. If the hardliners succeeded in Moscow, Lithuania might again face direct repression. Instead, the coup collapsed. Countries around the world rapidly recognized Lithuania's restored independence, and the Soviet Union itself recognized the Baltic states in September. By the end of that year, the Soviet Union had ceased to exist.

Serving Lithuania in a New Europe

Independence did not end my public service. I remained active in Lithuanian politics and later served in the European Parliament. Lithuania eventually joined NATO and the European Union in 2004, placing the country firmly within Western European political and security institutions. For someone who had lived through occupation and Soviet rule, seeing Lithuania again make its own international choices represented an extraordinary transformation.

The Soviet Republics Demand Greater Freedom - Told by Vytautas Landsbergis

When outsiders looked at a map of the Soviet Union in the 1980s, they saw one enormous country. We who lived within it knew the picture was more complicated. The USSR consisted of fifteen union republics and contained many nationalities, languages, religions, and historical traditions. I was Lithuanian. Others considered themselves Estonian, Latvian, Ukrainian, Georgian, Armenian, or members of still other peoples. Soviet citizenship had not erased these identities. Beneath the appearance of unity, national memories remained very much alive.

Memories Moscow Could Not Erase

For Lithuanians, history mattered enormously. Lithuania had been an independent republic between the world wars before Soviet forces occupied it in 1940 under circumstances connected to the secret protocols of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Estonia and Latvia suffered similar Soviet annexation. Deportations, political repression, wartime destruction, and postwar resistance became part of our collective memory. Soviet authorities could restrict how these subjects were publicly discussed, but families remembered. Churches remembered. Writers and artists remembered. A government may control textbooks, but controlling what parents tell their children is far more difficult.

Glasnost Gives Nationalism a Voice

When Mikhail Gorbachev introduced glasnost during the 1980s, the political atmosphere began changing. Greater openness allowed people to discuss subjects that previously had been censored or dangerous. In Lithuania, environmental concerns, preservation of our language, religious freedom, historical questions, and political rights brought people together. In 1988, the reform movement Sąjūdis emerged, and I became one of its leaders. What began partly as a movement supporting reform soon became something more powerful. We were no longer asking only how Moscow should govern us. Increasingly, we were asking why Moscow should govern us.

The Awakening Spreads

Similar movements were appearing across the Soviet Union. Estonia's Popular Front and Latvia's Popular Front demanded greater sovereignty. Ukrainians increasingly discussed their language, history, and political rights. In Armenia, the dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh helped produce enormous demonstrations. Georgia experienced a growing independence movement, and in April 1989 Soviet troops violently dispersed demonstrators in Tbilisi, killing civilians. National questions that Soviet leaders had long claimed were largely settled were suddenly appearing everywhere.

Two Million People Join Hands

On August 23, 1989, we demonstrated the strength of the Baltic independence movements in a way the world could understand immediately. Approximately two million Lithuanians, Latvians, and Estonians formed a human chain stretching roughly 600 kilometers across our three republics. We called it the Baltic Way. The date marked fifty years since the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. Families, workers, students, grandparents, and children stood hand in hand. There were no invading armies and no great weapons—only people standing together across three nations and demanding that history acknowledge what had happened to them.

Elections Change the Struggle

Gorbachev's political reforms also created opportunities that had not existed before. More competitive elections allowed national movements to demonstrate that their support extended far beyond small groups of dissidents. Sąjūdis candidates achieved major electoral successes, and in February 1990 supporters of restoring Lithuanian independence won a commanding position in elections to Lithuania's Supreme Council. I was chosen chairman. Suddenly, the independence movement was not merely marching in the streets. It possessed democratic authority within Lithuania's legislature.

Russia Begins Challenging Moscow Too

Perhaps the most surprising challenge came from Russia itself. Boris Yeltsin increasingly argued that the Russian republic should possess sovereignty over its own affairs. This was extraordinary because Russia formed the political, demographic, and geographic center of the Soviet Union. If Russia itself claimed powers from the central Soviet government, how could Moscow insist that Lithuania, Ukraine, Georgia, or the other republics surrender theirs? The struggle was no longer simply between Moscow and distant national movements. Authority was fragmenting at the very heart of the USSR.

Freedom Creates a Dangerous Question

By 1990, declarations of sovereignty were spreading among Soviet republics. Not every movement had the same goals, and not every population agreed about independence. Some demanded greater autonomy, others sovereignty within a transformed union, and others complete separation. Ethnic disputes also produced dangerous conflicts in several regions. Yet one fact was becoming impossible to ignore: the Soviet government could no longer assume that fifteen republics would remain together simply because Moscow commanded it.

The Empire Beneath the Map

This is what students must understand about the final years of the Soviet Union. The USSR did not suddenly break apart because people invented new national identities in 1991. Many of those identities were centuries old. What changed was the ability of people to organize, speak openly, vote, uncover suppressed history, and challenge central authority. Gorbachev had opened Soviet political life hoping to strengthen his country. Instead, millions of people discovered that they could finally ask a question Moscow had long tried to keep closed: if we are a nation, should we not have the right to decide our own future?

Lithuania Challenges Moscow: The Baltic Independence - Told by Landsbergis

By the end of the 1980s, Lithuania was still officially one of the fifteen republics of the Soviet Union. But many Lithuanians did not believe our nation had willingly surrendered its independence. Lithuania had been an independent republic before Soviet forces occupied it in 1940. Nearly fifty years later, that memory remained alive. Gorbachev's reforms gave us greater freedom to speak, organize, and investigate our past. Soon we faced a question that could no longer be avoided: if Lithuania had once been independent, why should we not restore that independence now?

The Baltic Nations Stand Together

We Lithuanians were not alone. Estonia and Latvia had also been independent before their incorporation into the Soviet Union. National movements grew throughout all three Baltic republics. On August 23, 1989, approximately two million people joined hands in the Baltic Way, a human chain stretching roughly 600 kilometers from Tallinn through Riga to Vilnius. The date marked the fiftieth anniversary of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, whose secret protocols had divided parts of Eastern Europe into German and Soviet spheres of influence. We wanted the world to see that Baltic independence was not merely the demand of a few politicians. It had become a mass movement.

March 11, 1990

Then came the moment when words became action. In February 1990, Lithuania held elections to its Supreme Council, and candidates supported by Sąjūdis achieved a commanding victory. I was elected chairman of the Supreme Council. On March 11, 1990, the council adopted the Act of the Re-Establishment of the State of Lithuania. We deliberately spoke of restoration rather than the creation of a new country. Our position was that Lithuania's independent state had never legally disappeared simply because it had been occupied. Lithuania became the first Soviet republic to formally declare the restoration of its independence.

Moscow Says No

The Soviet government rejected our declaration. Gorbachev demanded that we reverse it, and Moscow imposed an economic blockade in April 1990, restricting important supplies, including energy and raw materials. For ordinary Lithuanians, independence suddenly had a price. Factories faced difficulties, fuel became a concern, and economic pressure was intended to make us retreat. We sought negotiations, but we would not surrender the principle that Lithuania had the right to determine its own political future.

Tanks Enter Vilnius

The crisis became far more dangerous in January 1991. Soviet forces seized several buildings in Lithuania and moved against the television tower in Vilnius during the night of January 12–13. Thousands of civilians gathered around important institutions. They were largely unarmed, standing before armored vehicles and soldiers. Fourteen civilians died as a result of the Soviet assault, and hundreds were injured. Television broadcasts were disrupted, but Lithuania's government remained in place. Around the parliament building, citizens erected barricades and prepared to defend the institutions they had elected.

Songs Against Soldiers

There was something remarkable about the Baltic struggle. Much of our resistance relied not upon armies but upon demonstrations, elections, public gatherings, national symbols, and songs. Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia's independence movements became associated with what is often called the Singing Revolution. Singing patriotic songs might appear powerless beside tanks, but those gatherings created solidarity. Moscow possessed greater military force. We possessed something military force could not easily manufacture: large numbers of people willing to publicly identify themselves with their nations.

The August Coup Changes Everything

In August 1991, Communist hardliners attempted to seize control of the Soviet government. For Lithuania, the danger was immediate. A successful return to hardline rule might have destroyed the independence movement by force. Instead, the coup collapsed after several days. Boris Yeltsin emerged strengthened in Russia, Gorbachev returned to Moscow weakened, and Soviet authority rapidly disintegrated. Lithuania's independence received widespread international recognition, and on September 6 the Soviet Union itself formally recognized the independence of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia.

The Baltic States Return to the World

Within weeks, Lithuania joined the United Nations. Latvia and Estonia regained international recognition as well. By December, the Soviet Union itself was disappearing. What had begun with songs, demonstrations, historical arguments, and elections had survived blockades, political pressure, and military violence. Three relatively small Baltic nations had confronted one of the world's great superpowers and recovered their independence.

What Lithuania Proved

Our story should not be simplified into the idea that independence came easily or that every problem disappeared afterward. People were killed, families endured uncertainty, and the new Baltic governments faced difficult economic and political transitions. Yet Lithuania demonstrated something important during the final years of the Cold War. A government may possess tanks, ministries, and enormous armies, but political authority also depends upon whether people continue to accept its right to rule them. By 1991, increasing numbers of Lithuanians had stopped asking Moscow for permission to be free. We had begun acting as though Lithuania was already our country again.

My Name is Boris Yeltsin: President of Russia

I was born in 1931 in the Soviet Union, in the Ural region of Russia. My childhood was not easy. My family experienced the hardships of collectivization and Soviet life, and we learned to work with what we had. I grew into a stubborn and competitive young man. When someone told me something could not be done, my instinct was often to prove otherwise. That determination would eventually carry me from construction sites in the Urals to the Kremlin itself.

From Engineer to Communist Leader

I studied construction engineering and built my early career managing major building projects. Eventually, I entered Communist Party leadership and rose rapidly. In 1985, I became the Communist Party chief in Moscow. I demanded faster reforms, criticized privileges enjoyed by powerful officials, and developed a reputation for confrontation. I was still part of the Soviet system, but increasingly I believed that small reforms were not enough. Russia needed fundamental political and economic change.

My Break with Gorbachev

Mikhail Gorbachev had opened the door to reform, but I believed he was moving too slowly. Our disagreements became public, and I lost my senior Communist Party positions. Many thought my political career was finished. Instead, I returned through elections. In 1990, I became chairman of Russia's parliament, and Russia declared that its own laws held authority within its territory. I was no longer fighting merely for reform inside the Communist Party. I was fighting for a different political future for Russia.

President of Russia

In June 1991, Russian voters elected me president of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic. This was an extraordinary moment. Russia was still part of the Soviet Union, which meant that Gorbachev remained president of the USSR while I was president of its largest republic. Two centers of political authority now existed in Moscow. The struggle over who would shape Russia's future had moved into the open.

Standing Against the August Coup

In August 1991, Communist hardliners attempted to overthrow Gorbachev and stop the changes sweeping through the Soviet Union. Tanks entered Moscow. I went to the Russian parliament building, climbed onto a tank, and called upon citizens and soldiers to oppose the coup. I declared that the actions of the coup leaders were unconstitutional. Thousands gathered around the parliament. The coup collapsed within days, and the old Communist political structure was dealt a devastating blow.

The Soviet Union Comes Apart

After the coup, republic after republic moved toward independence. The Soviet Union was becoming a country whose central government could no longer hold its pieces together. In December 1991, I met with the leaders of Ukraine and Belarus. We agreed that the Soviet Union had effectively ceased to exist and created the Commonwealth of Independent States. Gorbachev resigned later that month. The Soviet flag disappeared from above the Kremlin, and Russia entered a new era.

Building a New Russia

Becoming the leader of independent Russia was easier than rebuilding it. We attempted to replace much of the Soviet command economy with a market economy, but the transition brought inflation, unemployment, corruption, enormous inequalities, and hardship. Political conflict also became dangerous. In 1993, my confrontation with parliament developed into an armed constitutional crisis in Moscow. Later, war erupted in Chechnya. Democracy had arrived, but democracy did not automatically bring stability or prosperity.

Leaving the Kremlin

By the end of the 1990s, Russia had changed dramatically, but many Russians were exhausted by years of economic and political turmoil. My own popularity had fallen, and my health had deteriorated. On December 31, 1999, I surprised the country by resigning and transferring presidential authority to Vladimir Putin. I told the Russian people that a new generation should lead the country into the new century.

Gorbachev vs. Yeltsin: Who Will Control Russia's Future? - Told by Boris Yeltsin

Mikhail Gorbachev and I were both Communists, both reformers, and both convinced that the Soviet system could not continue unchanged. At first, he brought me to Moscow and gave me important responsibilities. But our paths soon separated. Gorbachev wanted to reform the Soviet Union while preserving it. I increasingly believed that reforms were moving too slowly and that Russia needed greater political and economic freedom. What began as disagreement between two politicians eventually became a struggle between two governments.

My Fall from Power

As Communist Party chief in Moscow, I attacked bureaucracy, criticized privileges enjoyed by senior officials, and demanded faster reform. By 1987, my disagreements with Gorbachev and other party leaders had become impossible to hide. I was removed from the Moscow leadership and later from the Communist Party's Politburo. In the old Soviet political system, such a fall could have ended a man's career. But Gorbachev's own reforms had changed the rules. Elections were becoming more competitive, public debate was expanding, and politicians could increasingly appeal directly to voters instead of depending entirely upon Communist Party leaders.

The Voters Bring Me Back

In 1989, I won election to the new Congress of People's Deputies with overwhelming support in Moscow. The following year, I was elected chairman of the Russian parliament. This created a political situation the Soviet system had never been designed to handle. Gorbachev led the Soviet Union, but I now led Russia, its largest republic. Russia contained most of the Soviet Union's territory and population and much of its economic and military power. If Russia began taking authority away from the Soviet government, what would remain of Moscow's control?

Russia Declares Sovereignty

On June 12, 1990, the Russian parliament adopted a Declaration of State Sovereignty. This did not immediately remove Russia from the Soviet Union, but it asserted that Russian laws had priority within the Russian republic. Other Soviet republics were making similar claims. The consequences were enormous. For decades, the Soviet government had commanded the republics. Now the republics were increasingly telling the Soviet government where its authority ended. Gorbachev hoped to negotiate a new, looser union. I pushed for Russia to control more of its own future.

Two Presidents in Moscow

The rivalry became even stranger in June 1991, when Russian voters elected me president of the Russian republic in a popular election. Gorbachev was president of the Soviet Union, while I was president of Russia—and both of us worked in Moscow. Two presidents, two governments, and two competing sources of authority now occupied the capital. Gorbachev still controlled important Soviet institutions, but I possessed something increasingly powerful: a direct electoral mandate from Russian voters.

Reformers, Hardliners, and a Country Coming Apart

Our struggle was not simply personal. Gorbachev stood between opposing forces. Communist hardliners believed his reforms had gone dangerously far and were destroying the country. Reformers like me argued that he remained too attached to the Communist Party and the Soviet state. Meanwhile, Lithuania and other republics demanded independence, economic conditions deteriorated, and strikes and shortages increased. Gorbachev tried to hold the center together. The problem was that the center itself was disappearing.

The Union Treaty

By 1991, Gorbachev was negotiating a new Union Treaty that would transfer significant powers to the republics while preserving a common union. I participated in negotiations because Russia needed a workable relationship with the other republics. But every concession made to the republics weakened the old Soviet structure. Hardliners watched in alarm. To them, the treaty threatened to dismantle the Soviet Union piece by piece. To many national movements, however, even this new arrangement did not provide enough independence.

Who Would Control Russia's Future?

By the summer of 1991, the struggle had moved beyond whether Gorbachev or Yeltsin was the stronger politician. The deeper question was whether Russia's future would be determined by the Soviet government or by Russia's own elected institutions. Gorbachev had opened the political system and made competitive politics possible. I used those openings to challenge the authority of the system he was trying to preserve. Neither of us yet knew how quickly the final confrontation would arrive.

The Storm Approaches

In August 1991, Gorbachev left Moscow for his vacation residence in Crimea while preparations continued for the new Union Treaty. Hardline officials decided they could wait no longer. They believed the Soviet Union was approaching destruction and that extraordinary action was necessary to save it. Tanks would soon appear on Moscow's streets, Gorbachev would be isolated, and I would find myself standing before the Russian parliament facing the greatest political test of my life. Our rivalry was about to be overtaken by something even larger: an attempted coup that would decide whether the old Soviet order still had the power to survive.

The August Coup: Communist Hardliners Try to Stop the Collapse - Told by Yeltsin

By August 1991, the Soviet Union was coming apart before our eyes. Republics demanded sovereignty or independence, the Communist Party was losing authority, and President Mikhail Gorbachev was preparing a new Union Treaty that would transfer greater power to the republics. To Communist hardliners inside the government, this was not reform—it looked like national destruction. On August 19, they acted. They announced that Gorbachev could no longer perform his duties and created an emergency committee to take control of the country.

Gorbachev Is Cut Off

Gorbachev was at his vacation residence at Foros in Crimea when the conspirators isolated him from the outside world. They demanded that he support emergency rule. He refused. Meanwhile, Soviet television announced that Vice President Gennady Yanayev had assumed presidential powers because Gorbachev was supposedly ill. Tanks and armored vehicles entered Moscow. The plotters apparently expected the population and government institutions to obey as they had during earlier Soviet crackdowns. But this was not the Soviet Union of twenty or thirty years before.

I Arrive at the White House

I went to the Russian parliament building, commonly called the White House. Tanks surrounded parts of Moscow, and no one could know whether soldiers would eventually be ordered to attack us. I issued a declaration condemning the takeover as an unconstitutional coup and called for a general strike. Then came the image that would travel around the world: I climbed onto a tank outside the parliament and addressed the crowd. It was dramatic, certainly, but the greater question was not where I stood. It was whether the soldiers standing around me would obey orders to crush the resistance.

Moscow Refuses to Surrender

Thousands of citizens gathered around the Russian parliament. They erected barricades from buses, construction materials, and whatever else they could find. Politicians, workers, students, veterans, and ordinary families came to defend the building. Some military units hesitated to support the coup, and several tank crews sided with the Russian government. Information also proved difficult for the conspirators to control. Despite restrictions on broadcasting and newspapers, telephone calls, foreign radio, fax machines, photocopied statements, and other communications spread news of the resistance.

A Coup Without Confidence

The coup leaders possessed powerful titles and military forces, but they lacked unity and determination. Their televised press conference exposed their uncertainty to the country. Yanayev's visibly trembling hands became one of the memorable images of the crisis. More importantly, the conspirators failed to arrest me before organized resistance formed, failed to completely control communications, and could not guarantee that military commanders and soldiers would carry out an assault on the Russian parliament.

The Deadly Night

The crisis was not bloodless. During the night of August 20–21, armored vehicles encountered demonstrators near a tunnel in central Moscow. Three young men—Dmitry Komar, Ilya Krichevsky, and Vladimir Usov—were killed. Their deaths reminded everyone that events could still become a massacre. Yet the large-scale assault many feared never came. Military support for the emergency committee was crumbling, and troops began withdrawing from Moscow.

Three Days That Changed the Soviet Union

On August 21, the coup collapsed. Gorbachev returned from Crimea to Moscow, and the conspirators were arrested or fled. On the surface, it appeared that Gorbachev had been restored to power. In reality, the political balance had changed dramatically. The Communist Party had been badly discredited because senior officials had participated in the coup. My Russian government emerged stronger, while Gorbachev's Soviet government emerged weaker. Within days, I suspended Communist Party activities within Russian government institutions, and republics accelerated their movements toward independence.

They Tried to Save It—and Hastened Its End

The hardliners had attempted to stop the Soviet Union from collapsing. Their actions produced nearly the opposite result. Ukraine declared independence on August 24, and other republics accelerated their separation from Moscow. Estonia and Latvia had already moved to restore their independence during the crisis, and international recognition of the Baltic states followed rapidly. The authority of the central Soviet government was slipping away faster than ever.

The Tank Was Only the Beginning

People remember me standing on that tank, but the photograph can make the story appear simpler than it really was. The coup failed because of resistance from citizens and political leaders, divisions within the military and security establishment, mistakes by the conspirators, and years of political change that had made unquestioning obedience increasingly difficult. The hardliners wanted to turn history backward. Instead, their failed coup demonstrated how little power the old Soviet system still possessed. Four months later, there would no longer be a Soviet Union for anyone to seize.

Republic After Republic Declares Independence - Told by Vytautas Landsbergis

When Lithuania restored its independence on March 11, 1990, Moscow rejected our action and tried to force us backward. Yet we were only the beginning of a much larger transformation. The Soviet Union contained fifteen republics, and movements for sovereignty were spreading among them. Estonia and Latvia followed paths similar to ours, while Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, Moldova, and others increasingly challenged Moscow's authority. What once appeared to be a permanent superpower was becoming a collection of nations asking whether they still wanted to remain together.

Sovereignty Comes Before Independence

The breakup did not happen all at once. During 1990 and 1991, many republics first issued declarations of sovereignty, asserting that their own laws and governments possessed greater authority over local affairs. Even Russia, the largest and most powerful Soviet republic, declared state sovereignty in June 1990. This was a remarkable development. The Soviet Union had been dominated politically by institutions centered in Moscow, yet now the Russian republic itself, under leaders including Boris Yeltsin, was taking authority away from the central Soviet government.

The Baltic States Push Ahead

Lithuania had declared the restoration of independence in March 1990. Estonia and Latvia also moved steadily toward restoring their independent states. Moscow resisted, and Soviet violence in Vilnius and Riga during January 1991 demonstrated that independence could carry a terrible price. Nevertheless, the movements continued. When Communist hardliners attempted their coup in August 1991, Estonia declared the restoration of its independence on August 20, while Latvia completed its restoration of independence on August 21. The coup collapsed that same day.

The Coup Breaks Moscow's Authority

The failed August coup changed everything. The conspirators had claimed they were saving the Soviet Union, but their defeat demonstrated how weak the central government had become. Republic leaders feared another attempt to restore hardline Communist control and saw an opportunity to secure their own authority. Independence declarations now arrived rapidly. Ukraine declared independence on August 24. Belarus followed on August 25, Moldova on August 27, Azerbaijan on August 30, and Kyrgyzstan on August 31. Uzbekistan declared independence on September 1.

The Caucasus and Central Asia Move Away

Other republics had their own complicated paths. Georgia had declared the restoration of its independence in April 1991. Armenia held an independence referendum in September and declared independence soon afterward. Tajikistan declared independence in September, while Turkmenistan followed in October. Kazakhstan, closely connected economically and politically to Russia and home to a large Russian population, waited longer than most. On December 16, 1991, Kazakhstan declared independence, becoming the last Soviet republic to do so.

Ukraine Makes the Breakup Unavoidable

One decision was especially important because of Ukraine's enormous population, territory, economy, agriculture, industry, and military importance. On December 1, 1991, Ukrainians voted in a referendum on independence. More than 90 percent of participating voters supported it, with a majority for independence in every region of the republic. Once Ukraine chose independence, preserving anything resembling the old Soviet Union became extraordinarily difficult. A union without Russia was difficult to imagine, but a union of Russia without Ukraine would be something fundamentally different from the USSR that had existed for generations.

The World Recognizes New Nations

For Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, September 1991 brought the recognition for which we had struggled. The Soviet government formally recognized Baltic independence on September 6. Later that month, our three countries entered the United Nations. Other Soviet republics soon began establishing diplomatic relations and preparing to join international organizations as independent states. Embassies had to be opened, currencies considered, militaries reorganized, borders administered, and governments transformed. Independence was not merely a declaration. It required constructing the institutions of a functioning state.

Fifteen Republics Become Fifteen Countries

By December 1991, the political map that generations of students had known was disappearing. Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan emerged from the Soviet Union as independent states. Their experiences were very different, and independence would bring new opportunities as well as economic crises, political struggles, and armed conflicts.

When People Stop Believing the Map

The collapse of the Soviet Union teaches something that a political map cannot show. Borders may appear permanent because they are printed in textbooks and defended by governments, but states ultimately depend upon institutions and people accepting their authority. By 1991, millions across the Soviet republics were transferring their loyalty and political authority toward their own republics. Lithuania had once appeared almost alone when we challenged Moscow. Less than two years later, the Soviet Union itself was disappearing. The question was no longer which republic would leave next. It was whether there would soon be any Soviet Union left to leave.

December 1991: The Soviet Union Ceases to Exist - Told by Boris Yeltsin

By December 1991, the Soviet Union still existed officially, but its foundations had nearly disappeared. Republic after republic had declared independence. Mikhail Gorbachev remained president of the USSR, yet the central Soviet government controlled far less than it once had. My government in Russia was assuming greater authority, and the other republics were doing the same. The question facing us was no longer simply how to reform the Soviet Union. We had to decide whether there was still a union to reform.

Ukraine Makes Its Choice

Ukraine changed the situation decisively. On December 1, Ukrainians voted in a referendum on independence. More than 90 percent of participating voters supported independence, with majorities in every region of the republic. Ukraine was too important to the Soviet Union to ignore. It possessed a huge population, productive farmland, major industries, Black Sea ports, and part of the Soviet nuclear arsenal. Gorbachev continued hoping for a renewed union, but I could not see how the old Soviet state could survive when Russia and Ukraine were moving in different directions.

A Meeting in the Forest

On December 7, I traveled to a government residence in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, a forest region in Belarus. There I met Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk and Belarusian leader Stanislav Shushkevich. Our delegations faced an extraordinary problem: what political relationship should replace the Soviet Union? The next day, December 8, Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus signed what became known as the Belavezha Accords. We declared that the USSR, as a geopolitical reality and subject of international law, was ceasing to exist and announced the creation of a Commonwealth of Independent States.

Calling Washington

That same day, I telephoned President George H. W. Bush. The conversation showed just how quickly events were moving. I explained the agreement and told him that Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus were establishing a commonwealth rather than preserving the old Soviet state. Nuclear weapons were an immediate concern. The Soviet Union possessed thousands of them, and no responsible leader could treat their command and security as an afterthought. The Cold War might have been ending, but the disappearance of a nuclear superpower created dangers unlike anything the world had faced before.

Gorbachev Is Left Without a Country

Gorbachev objected that three republics alone could not simply determine the fate of the entire Soviet Union. Constitutionally and politically, the situation was complicated. Yet events continued moving against the central government. On December 21, leaders of eleven former Soviet republics met in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan, and joined the Commonwealth framework. The Soviet institutions over which Gorbachev presided were losing the governments, territories, and political authority necessary to function.

Christmas Day at the Kremlin

On December 25, Gorbachev addressed the country and resigned as president of the Soviet Union. That evening, the red Soviet flag bearing the hammer and sickle was lowered from above the Kremlin, and the Russian tricolor flew in its place. It was an extraordinary sight. The Soviet Union had emerged from revolution and civil war, defeated Nazi Germany at enormous human cost, built nuclear weapons, sent the first human into space, and competed with the United States across the globe. Now its president had resigned because the country he governed was disappearing.

December 26, 1991

The final institutional step came the following day. On December 26, the Soviet of the Republics, part of the USSR's Supreme Soviet, formally recognized that the Soviet Union had ceased to exist. Russia became widely recognized as the USSR's continuation state internationally, including taking over the Soviet permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. But Russia was not simply the Soviet Union with another flag. Fourteen other former Soviet republics were now independent countries, and each would begin determining its own future.

The Cold War Ends, but the Problems Remain

People sometimes imagine that when the Soviet flag came down, one story simply ended and another began. It was not so clean. We inherited an economy in severe crisis, weakened government institutions, military forces requiring reorganization, disputes over property and borders, and the enormous responsibility of Soviet nuclear weapons spread across Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan. Millions of people suddenly found themselves living in newly independent countries. The collapse of a superpower created freedom for some, uncertainty for many, and questions that would continue long after 1991.

My Name is George H. W. Bush: President of the United States

I was born in Milton, Massachusetts, in 1924. I grew up believing that privilege carried an obligation to serve. When the United States entered World War II, I enlisted in the Navy as soon as I could and became one of its youngest aviators. In 1944, my aircraft was shot down during a bombing mission in the Pacific. I survived, but two members of my crew did not. I never forgot them, and the experience strengthened my belief that public service should be approached with humility and duty.

Family, Business, and Texas

After the war, I married Barbara Pierce, the woman who would remain beside me throughout my life, and attended Yale University. Rather than remain in the Northeast, we moved to Texas, where I entered the oil business. We raised a family while I learned the risks and rewards of building something from the ground up. Eventually, I felt drawn toward another kind of service—politics.

Learning Washington and the World

I served in the U.S. House of Representatives before President Richard Nixon appointed me ambassador to the United Nations. Later, I became chairman of the Republican National Committee, America's chief diplomatic representative in China, and director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Each position taught me something different. Diplomacy taught patience. Intelligence work taught caution. International affairs taught me that presidents rarely receive the luxury of making decisions with perfect information.

Eight Years as Vice President

In 1980, Ronald Reagan selected me as his running mate. For eight years, I served as vice president while the United States confronted the Soviet Union, strengthened its alliances, expanded its military capabilities, and negotiated with Soviet leaders. I traveled widely and met leaders across the world. By Reagan's second term, Mikhail Gorbachev was changing the Soviet Union. Something important was happening, but we could not know exactly where those changes would lead.

Becoming President

In 1988, the American people elected me the 41st president of the United States. I entered office at an extraordinary moment. Communist governments were weakening across Eastern Europe, protests were growing, and the Soviet Union was changing rapidly. When the Berlin Wall opened in November 1989, there was enormous temptation to celebrate America's triumph. I deliberately avoided boasting. History was moving quickly, and humiliating Soviet leaders could have made peaceful change more difficult.

Germany and a Changing Europe

One of the great questions before us was German reunification. Germany had been divided since the aftermath of World War II, and suddenly reunification became possible. Working with Chancellor Helmut Kohl, Gorbachev, our NATO allies, and others, we supported a peaceful path toward a unified Germany. In October 1990, East and West Germany officially became one country. Europe was being transformed without the great-power war that so many previous European transformations had produced.

Watching the Soviet Union Crumble

By 1991, the Soviet crisis had moved beyond Eastern Europe. Soviet republics demanded sovereignty and independence, Boris Yeltsin challenged Gorbachev's authority, and Communist hardliners attempted a coup in August. We watched carefully because the Soviet Union still possessed an enormous nuclear arsenal. When the coup failed and the republics accelerated their drive for independence, our responsibility was not simply to declare victory. We had to help manage an extraordinarily dangerous transition.

The Cold War Ends

In December 1991, Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus announced that the Soviet Union would cease to exist. Gorbachev resigned on Christmas Day. The American-Soviet rivalry that had shaped nearly half a century of international affairs was over. Yet the disappearance of our principal Cold War rival created new questions: What would become of Soviet nuclear weapons? Could Russia establish democratic institutions? How would the newly independent republics survive? The end of one era did not guarantee the stability of the next.

Leaving the Presidency

My presidency also included the invasion of Panama, the Persian Gulf crisis and war, economic difficulties at home, and difficult debates over taxes and federal spending. In 1992, I lost my campaign for reelection to Bill Clinton. In January 1993, I left the White House and returned to private life, though I continued humanitarian work and developed friendships with former political rivals. Public office had ended, but service did not have to end with it.

15 New Countries and Thousands of Nuclear Weapons - Told by George H. W. Bush

When the Soviet Union disappeared in December 1991, Americans had every reason to recognize the importance of the moment. The Cold War rivalry that had shaped nearly half a century was ending. But as president, I could not look at the Soviet collapse simply as an American victory. A nuclear superpower containing fifteen republics was breaking apart. Governments were changing, military commands were being reorganized, and thousands of nuclear weapons remained scattered across a vast territory. Our immediate responsibility was to help make this historic transition as peaceful and secure as possible.

One Country Becomes Fifteen

The Soviet Union had consisted of fifteen union republics. With its collapse, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan emerged as independent states. Each inherited different populations, industries, resources, political institutions, and problems. We now needed diplomatic relationships with governments that only months earlier had been parts of one superpower. New flags could be raised quickly; building stable states would take much longer.

The Nuclear Question

Nothing concerned us more immediately than nuclear weapons. The Soviet Union had built the world's largest nuclear arsenal, with thousands of strategic and tactical nuclear warheads. When the USSR collapsed, strategic nuclear weapons were located in four newly independent countries: Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan. Nuclear command arrangements remained heavily centralized, but the political map underneath those weapons had suddenly changed. We needed to know who would control them, how they would be secured, and whether previous arms-control agreements would survive the Soviet state that had signed them.

Ukraine Becomes a Nuclear Giant Overnight

Ukraine drew particular attention. Soviet strategic weapons left on Ukrainian territory included intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear-capable bombers. By the number of strategic nuclear warheads located on its territory, independent Ukraine suddenly possessed what was often described as the world's third-largest nuclear arsenal. Kazakhstan also contained major Soviet missile installations, while Belarus hosted strategic missiles. These countries had not independently built those arsenals, and operational control was complicated, but their presence created a problem the international community could not ignore.

Former Rivals Begin Working Together

The United States had spent decades preparing to deter Soviet nuclear forces. Now Americans and former Soviet officials had reason to cooperate in reducing the danger those weapons presented. Senators Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar had already led Congress in creating the Cooperative Threat Reduction program in late 1991. It authorized American assistance to help former Soviet states dismantle weapons of mass destruction, secure dangerous materials, and reduce nuclear threats. It was an extraordinary reversal: resources from the United States could now help dismantle weapons originally built to threaten the United States.

START Must Survive the Soviet Union

Only months before the Soviet collapse, Gorbachev and I had signed the START I treaty in July 1991 to reduce American and Soviet strategic nuclear arsenals. But suddenly one of the treaty's two countries no longer existed. The United States therefore worked with Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan to preserve the arms-control process. In May 1992, the Lisbon Protocol made those four states parties to START I and established a framework under which Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine would join the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty as non-nuclear-weapon states.

Weapons Begin Moving Toward Russia

The process took years and continued after I left office. Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine eventually transferred the Soviet nuclear warheads remaining on their territories to Russia, while delivery systems were removed or dismantled under arms-control arrangements. Kazakhstan transferred its remaining nuclear warheads by 1995, and Ukraine and Belarus completed transfers by 1996. The danger had not vanished, but the possibility of several additional nuclear-armed successor states was avoided.

The Human Problem Behind the Weapons

There was another danger that received less attention from the public. The Soviet military-industrial system employed scientists, engineers, technicians, soldiers, and nuclear specialists. Economic collapse could leave highly trained people without reliable salaries or stable institutions. Nuclear materials and other dangerous technologies also required protection. Preventing proliferation meant more than counting missiles. It meant securing facilities, maintaining professional safeguards, dismantling weapons safely, and preventing dangerous knowledge or materials from reaching those who might misuse them.

New World Begins: What Comes After the Cold War? - Told by George H. W. Bush

On December 25, 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev resigned as president of the Soviet Union, and the Soviet flag was lowered over the Kremlin. For more than four decades, American presidents had organized much of our foreign policy around one enormous challenge: competition with the Soviet Union. We had built alliances, stationed troops overseas, accumulated nuclear weapons, fought proxy wars, and prepared for a conflict we desperately hoped would never become a direct nuclear war. Suddenly, the Soviet Union was gone. We had reached the end of the Cold War, but history had certainly not ended.

America Stands in an Unusual Position

The United States entered this new era with extraordinary global influence. Our principal superpower rival had disappeared, while our alliances with countries in Europe and Asia remained. Some commentators described this as a "unipolar" moment because no other country possessed the same combination of military, economic, diplomatic, and technological power. But power brings responsibility. We now had to decide how the United States should use its influence when containing Soviet expansion was no longer the organizing purpose of American foreign policy.

Europe Is Redrawn

Europe had already begun transforming before the USSR's final collapse. Germany reunified in October 1990. Communist governments across Eastern Europe had fallen, and countries such as Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia were establishing new political and economic systems. The Warsaw Pact dissolved in 1991, removing the military alliance that had confronted NATO. Yet NATO itself remained. The question of Europe's future security—including NATO's future relationships with countries formerly under Soviet influence—would become one of the major issues of the post-Cold War period.

Russia Is No Longer the Soviet Union

Russia inherited much of the Soviet Union's international position, including its permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, but Boris Yeltsin's Russia faced a radically different situation. The new Russian government attempted sweeping economic reforms while dealing with inflation, shortages, political conflict, and the difficult transition away from Communist institutions. Washington sought cooperation with Moscow on nuclear arms reductions and international security. We hoped Russia could develop representative institutions and a more open economy, but Russians themselves would ultimately determine their country's political direction.

New Nations Bring New Questions

The Soviet breakup created fifteen independent states, but the USSR was not the only multinational Communist country experiencing upheaval. Yugoslavia was breaking apart violently, producing wars that would continue through much of the 1990s. Czechoslovakia would separate peacefully into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993. Across Europe and Eurasia, old questions about borders, ethnicity, nationalism, and political identity returned. The Cold War had sometimes suppressed local conflicts beneath the larger American-Soviet rivalry. Its disappearance allowed some of those tensions to come back into the open.

The Gulf War Shows a Different Kind of Conflict

Even before the Soviet Union disappeared, we saw evidence that the next era would not simply be peaceful. In August 1990, Saddam Hussein's Iraq invaded Kuwait. The United States helped assemble a broad international coalition operating under United Nations Security Council resolutions. In early 1991, coalition forces expelled Iraqi forces from Kuwait during the Gulf War. The conflict demonstrated that the post-Cold War world would still contain aggression, regional rivalries, dictatorships, and wars even when those conflicts were no longer primarily extensions of American-Soviet competition.

Globalization Accelerates

Another transformation was occurring beyond military affairs. International trade, finance, computers, telecommunications, satellite communications, and increasingly interconnected businesses were drawing countries closer together. The World Wide Web had only recently been developed, but digital communications would soon begin transforming commerce and daily life. The United States, Europe, and rapidly growing Asian economies were entering an era in which goods, information, money, and eventually digital services could move across borders at unprecedented speed.

Old Threats Fade, New Ones Appear

The danger of a massive American-Soviet nuclear exchange diminished, but nuclear weapons did not disappear. Neither did terrorism, ethnic warfare, authoritarian governments, regional conflicts, or disputes over natural resources and territory. The United States also faced difficult questions about when it should intervene abroad and when it should remain outside a conflict. Without the Cold War's relatively clear framework, each new crisis could demand a different calculation.

The Beginning, Not the Ending

When historians look at 1991, it is tempting to place a neat dividing line on the page: Cold War before it, post-Cold War world afterward. Those of us living through the moment could not see what came next so clearly. We knew that an extraordinary confrontation had ended peacefully. We did not know how Russia would develop, how NATO would change, how China would rise, how revolutionary communications technologies would reshape society, or what new threats would emerge. The Cold War had given generations a frightening but familiar map of world politics. Now that map had been erased, and humanity was beginning to draw another.