Fall of the Soviet Union | Meaning & Concept [Explained]

We tell you how was the fall of the Soviet Union. In addition, its causes and the stages of the process that led to an end.

The dissolution of the USSR in December 1991 marked the end of the Cold War.

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How was the fall of the Soviet Union?

The fall of the Soviet Union (USSR) It was the process by which the Soviet Union ceased to exist (officially called Union of Soviet Socialist Republics)which had been created by the Bolshevik government in 1922 .

The Soviet Union made up fifteen republics governed by the Secretary General of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (PCUS). Between 1990 and 1991, the Soviet republics proclaimed their independence And, for the most part, they joined the community of Independent States (CEI), created by an agreement between Russia, Ukraine and Belarus.

The process that determined the fall of the Soviet Union began with the reforms of Mijaíl Gorbachev general secretary of the PCUS, since 1985. The Perestroika (economic restructuring) deepened the economic difficulties that the Soviet Union crossed, and the Glasnost (transparency) He opened the way to democratic expressions and nationalist movements.

The criticism of the communist bureaucracy and the claims of greater freedom (political and economic) were exacerbated due to events such as the accident at the Chernobil nuclear power plant (Ukraine) in 1986, the prolonged Soviet invasion of Afghanistan (which concluded with the withdrawal of troops in 1989) and the fall of the communist regimes of the Eastern Block of Europe in 1989.

The first multi -party elections in 1990 favored nationalist parties. In Russia, the democratic and liberal faction of Boris Yeltsin became important, who headed a popular protest against an attempted coup d’etat of Orthodox Marxists in August 1991.

Following these facts, The PCUS was prohibited. Gorbachev resigned from his position as president of the USSR on December 25 and, On December 31, 1991, the Soviet Union officially ceased to exist. This fact ended the cold war.

Mijaíl Gorbachev predecessors

Yuri Andrópov (1983-1984)

Yuti Andrópov (1914-1984) was the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (PCUS) and leader of the Soviet Union since the death of Leonid Breznev in November 1982, until his own death fifteen months later.

He entered the PCUS in 1939 and was ascending in the hierarchy of the Soviet bureaucracy. As ambassador to Hungary (July 1954 to March 1957), he played a key role in the country’s Soviet invasion in 1956. After returning to Moscow, he continued his career and was appointed Director of the KGB (Committee for State Security), the Soviet Secret Police position he held between 1967 and 1982. Andrópov adopted a hard line based on the repression of any type of political dissent.

Was elected general secretary of the PCUS on November 12, 1982, two days after the death of Breznev, but He could barely govern for his health problems . He disappeared from public events in August 1983 and was replaced after his death, which occurred on February 9, 1984, by Konstantin Chernenko.

Konstantin Chernenko (1984-1985)

Konstantin Chernenko (1911-1985) was the Leader of the Soviet Union from February 1984 until his death on March 10, 1985 . He joined the PCUS in 1931 and amounted to the positions of the Soviet bureaucracy until he became Chief of Cabinet of Breznev when he reached leadership in 1964.

His close relationship with Breznev and his conservative positions made for many the most likely successor after his death. However, he was not able to unite the different factions of the party when Breznev died in 1982 and it was Yuri Andrópov who agreed to the position of general secretary of the PCUS.

Andrópov’s rapid death led Chernenko to power in February 1984, at 72 years of age. Like his predecessor, Chernenko He quickly showed signs of deterioration in his health . His diseases caused that he often could not attend his official commitments. After his death in March 1985, a younger political figure arrived at Kremlin: Mijaíl Gorbachev .

The Perestroika and the Glasnost

In 1987 Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan signed the treaty on nuclear forces of intermediate range.

The process that led to the fall of the Soviet Union began with the reforms implemented by Mikhaíl Gorbachov from 1985 . When Gorbachev agreed to the position of general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (PCUS) in 1985, the Soviet Union went through important economic and political difficulties. To deal with this situation, the Soviet leader took a series of internal and external policy measures:

An economic reform known as Perestroika (restructuring) which supposed the liberalization of some aspects of the economy.
A political reform known as Glasnost (transparency) which consisted of democratizing politics and the media.
A distension of relations with the United States and a reduction of military spending (which implied the abandonment of the Breznev doctrine, which allowed to intervene militarily in the satellite states of the Soviet Union in Central and Eastern Europe).

The Perestroika exacerbated economic problems while Glasnost allowed the information to circulate and the population was expressed With greater freedom. This caused manifestations of discontent towards the Soviet bureaucracy.

The political crisis of the Soviet Union and the discontent towards its authorities deepened due to the accident in a Chernobyl nuclear power plant (Ukraine) in 1986, which was treated with secretism by the Soviet authorities, and the root of the thousands of dead caused by the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, which had begun in 1979 and only in 1988 led to Gorbachev’s commitment to withdraw the troops (the Soviet withdrawal concluded in February 1989).

The 1989 revolutions in Central and Eastern Europe

The abandonment of Breznev doctrine by Gorbachev in 1988 favored the rapid drop in communist regimes in Central and Eastern Europe that they could no longer resort to the military force of the countries of the Warsaw Pact (and especially of the Soviet Union) to sustain themselves.

The 1989 revolutions caused the Establishment of multi -party democracies and market economies in central and eastern Europe, and generated The fall of the Berlin Wall (1989) and the subsequent reunification of Germany (1990) . This situation decided the end of the Soviet block and contributed to accelerate the disintegration process that was taking place in the Soviet Union itself.

The nationalist movements and the independence of the Soviet republics

In the middle of a deep economic crisis and with a population that, thanks to the Glasnosthe manifested more and more discontent with the Soviet regime, Nationalism came to act as a disintegration factor of the Soviet state (Heir of the Tsarist Empire).

The Baltic Republics (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) had been annexed to the Soviet Union through the Pact of German-Soviet aggression They signed VIACHESLAV Molotov and Joachim von Ribbentrop In 1939. During the 1989 European fall, they made clear their intention to break the ties with the Soviet Union. In parallel, nationalism began to express itself in the Caucasian republics, prompted by the confrontation between Armenians and Azeri in Nagorno-Karabaj in 1988.

When, In February 1990, Gorbachev resigned from the political monopoly of the PCUS and convened partially pluralistic legislative elections (in which non -communist candidates could participate) in the fifteen republics that made up the Soviet Union, In Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Moldova won the independence political forces .

Lithuania immediately declared its independence on March 11, 1990, which laid a precedent for the other republics that constituted the Soviet Union, which followed their example in the following months.

Boris Yeltsin’s rise

Boris Yeltsin left the PCUS and headed protests against the 1991 coup d’etat.

The claims of the small Baltic countries were not the factor that caused the final disintegration of the Soviet Union. The movement that caused the final fall of the USSR came from Russia .

In May 1990, Borís Yeltsin, who had been expelled from his position on the PCUS in 1987 for criticizing the slowness of Gorbachev’s reforms, was elected president of the Russian Parliament. From that position of power, Yeltsin supported the search for autonomy of the Soviet republics and promoted other measures that precipitated the end of the Soviet Union.

In July 1990, the XXVIII Congress of the PCUS was marked by the confrontation between the factions that defended the centrism of Gorbachev, which proposed a return to orthodox Marxism and those that bet on a radical change towards democracy and the market economy.

Yeltsin, who represented the faction of radical change, decided to leave the PCUS . In December 1990, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Eduard Shevarnadze, resigned from his charge in protest of what he saw as an imminent coup d’etat of the Orthodox Marxists that would return the country to the time of Breznev.

The failed coup against Gorbachev

Cornered between, on the one hand, the conservative communist forces sought a turning back in the reform process, and on the other hand, the reformist and nationalist forces, Gorbachev He tried to negotiate a new Treaty of the Union that would rebuild the Soviet Union on new bases of greater national freedom.

However, the Orthodox communists tried to impose a force solution and, on August 19, 1991, Gorbachev He was kidnapped in his summer residence in the Black Sea. Thus, A group of communists of the hard line was put in charge of a military coup. But the lack of unity in the army and the popular protest actions in Moscow made the blow fail.

The end of the Soviet Union (USSR)

Russia, Belarus and Ukraine formed a Confederation to which other Soviet Republics joined.

On December 1, 1991, 90.3 % of Ukrainians voted in favor of independence. On December 8, in an improvised solution, Russia’s leaders (Boris Yeltsin), Ukraine (Leonid Kravchuk) and Belarus (Stanislav Shushkévich) were found near Brest (Antiguo Brest-Litovsk) and agreed the so-called Belovezhskaya Pusha Declaration Pusha (Also called Belavezha Treaty) : The three Slavic republics They left the Soviet Union and formed a Confederation called Community of Independent States (CEI) .

On December 21, in a meeting held in Almá-Atá (current Almath, in Kazakhstan), Eight of the twelve remaining republics of the Soviet Union followed the example of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. The CEI was formed. For its part, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Georgia although they had been constituted as independent states, they did not agree to join the Confederation (although Georgia joined in 1993).

Abandoned by almost all, Gorbachev resigned as president of the Soviet Union on December 25, 1991. The Soviet Red Flag was stuck in the Moscow Kremlin and was replaced by the Russian flag . Russia took over from the USSR in the international scene: embassies, permanent position in the UN Security Council and the control of the Soviet nuclear armament. However, the bipolar world of the cold war was over. The Soviet Union officially ceased to exist on December 31, 1991 .

See more at: End of the Cold War

Belavezha’s Treaty

On December 8, 1991, the leaders of three of the republics that constituted the Soviet Union met to agree on their dissolution and, instead, create a community of independent states. Stanislav Shushkevich and Vyacheslav Kebich, as representatives of Belarus, Boris Yeltsin and Gennady Burbulis, as representatives of the Russian Federation, Leonid and Vitold Fokin, as representatives of Ukraine, signed the Belavezha Treaty.

Through the Belavezha treaty, the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the creation, instead, of independent and sovereign democratic states, was agreed. In addition, the right of self -determination of peoples and the commitment to guarantee human rights and civil freedoms was recognized. The creation of an international community for the cooperation of the former Soviet republics, called the community of independent states.

Agreement to establish the community of independent states
December 8, 1991
“We the Republics of Belarus, the Russian Federation (RSFSR) and Ukraine as founding states of the USSR, signatories of the 1922 Union Treaty, hereinafter called high contracting parties, we find that the USSR, as a subject of international law and geopolitical reality, ceases to exist.
Based on the historical closeness of our peoples and on the relationships that have been formed between them, taking into account the bilateral treaties concluded between the high contracting parts,
Wishing to build a democratic and law,
Aspiring to develop their mutual relations on the basis of mutual recognition and respect of state sovereignty, the right to self -determination, the principles of equal rights, not interference in internal affairs, the renunciation of the use of force and the economic and other pressures, the solution of controversies by peaceful means and other universally recognized principles of international law,
Taking into account that the future development and strengthening of friendly relations, good neighborhood and mutually beneficial cooperation among our states responds to the most important national interests of their peoples and serves the cause of peace and security,
Reaffirming our commitment to the purposes and principles of the United Nations Charter, the final act of Helsinki and other documents of the conference on security and cooperation in Europe,
Committing to observe the universally accepted international norms of human rights and peoples.
We have agreed the following:
Art. 1. The high contracting parties form a community of independent states.
Art. 2. The high contracting parties guarantee their citizens, regardless of their nationality or other differences, the same rights and freedoms. Each of the high contracting parties guarantees the citizens of the other parties, as well as the people without citizenship that reside in their territory, regardless of their national belonging or other differences, civil, political, political, economic and cultural rights and freedoms, in accordance with the International Standards of Universally recognized Human Rights.
Art. 3. The high contracting parts, wishing to ensure the expression, conservation and development of ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious traditions of ethnic minority that live in their territories and existing ethnocultural regions, commit themselves to their protection.
Art. 4. The high contracting parties will develop mutual cooperation and in the foot of equality in the political, economic, cultural, health, health, environmental, scientific, humanitarian and other defense spheres, as well as they will act together in a wide informative exchange and will observe in good faith the mutual obligations. The parties consider to conclude cooperation agreements in the aforementioned areas.
Art. 5. The high contracting parties recognize and respect their territorial integrity and the inviolability of existing borders within the community. The parties guarantee the open character of the borders, the freedom of circulation of citizens and the free information exchange within the community.
Art. 6. The Member States of the Community shall collaborate to ensure international peace and security, and to take effective measures to limit military expenses and military arsenals. They will be oriented towards the liquidation of all types of nuclear weapons and the achievement of a universal and total disarmament under strict international control.
The parties will respect mutual aspirations to acquire the Free Zone Statute of Nuclear Armament and Neutral State.
The Member States of the Community will retain and support a common military and strategic space, under a united command, including unified control of nuclear weapons. The completion of the aforementioned control will be regulated by an independent agreement.
The parties will also guarantee the necessary conditions for the deployment, material and social supply of the strategic armed forces. The parties will commit to carry out a policy agreed in the social security spheres and retirement benefits of the military and their families.
Art. 7. The high contracting parties recognize that the sphere of their joint activities carried out on the basis of equal rights and through the general coordination institutions of the community includes:
Coordination of foreign policy.
Cooperation in the formation and development of the common economic space, European and Euro-Asian markets, in the sphere of customs policy.
Collaboration in the development of transport and communication systems.
Cooperation in the Environmental Protection Sphere, Participation in the formation of a single international ecological security system.
Issues of migration policy.
Fight against organized crime
Art. 8. The parties are fully aware that the Chernobyl catastrophe affected the entire planet and commit to unite and coordinate their efforts to minimize and liquidate the consequences of said catastrophe.
Art. 9. All controversies regarding the interpretation and application of the rules of this Agreement shall be resolved through negotiations between the corresponding organisms and if necessary at the level of governments and states.
Art. 10. Each of the high contracting parties retains the right of their pending the validity of this agreement or of any of their articles, warning the other participants of the agreement with a minimum in advance of one year. The stipulations of this Agreement may be complemented or modified by agreement of the high contracting parties.
Art. 11. As of the date of signing this Agreement, they will not be vigorous, in the territories of the signatory states, the norms of third states, including those of the Soviet ex-union.
Art. 12. The high contracting parties will guarantee the fulfillment of the international obligations derived from the agreements and agreements of the former Soviet Union.
Art. 13. This agreement will not affect the obligations of the high contracting parties with third states. –
This agreement is open to all states of the former Soviet Union, as well as other states that share the objectives and principles of this Agreement.
Art. 14. The official headquarters of the community coordination agencies shall be established in the city of Minsk.
The activity of the former Soviet Union in the territories of the states participating in the community ceases.“
By Belarus: S. Shushkevich – V. Kebich
By Russia: B. Yeltsin – G. Burbulis
By Ukraine: L. Kravchuk – Fokin

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References

Britannica, Encyclopaedia (2022). Collapse of the Soviet Union. Britannica Encyclopedia. https://www.britannica.com/
Ray, M. (2018). WHY DID THE SOVIET UNION COLLAPSE?. Britannica Encyclopedia. https://www.britannica.com/
Saborido, J. (2009). History of the Soviet Union. I emecé.
“Agreements to establish the community of independent states.” European Commission for Democracy Through Law. Minsk, 1991 (own translation). Available at: https://www.venice.coe.int/