ROME. “We do not understand what happened in Europe at the end of the twentieth century without considering the role of John Paul II,” said the last Soviet leader as the Cold War ended. People strolling through Moscow’s snow-covered Red Square on the evening of December 25, 1991 witnessed one of the pivotal moments of the 20th century: the Soviet red flag on the Kremlin was lowered for the last time and replaced with the Federation tricolor. Russian. A few minutes earlier, in fact, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev had announced his resignation in a televised address to the nation, thus concluding 74 years of Soviet history. In his memoirs, Gorbachev, now ninety, bitterly recalled his inability to prevent the end of the USSR. An event that an event that upset the world balance of power and sowed the seeds of an ongoing tug-of-war between Russia and neighboring Ukraine. “I still regret not being able to get the ship under my command in calm waters, not being able to complete the reform of the country,” wrote Gorbachev. Meanwhile, the Vatican Ostpolitik and the Polish Pope Karol Wojtyla competed through Solidarnosc to overcome the Iron Curtain.
And the story changed
Political experts have been debating for thirty years whether he could have kept his position and saved the USSR. Some accuse Gorbachev, who came to power in 1985, of not having been able to prevent Soviet breakup. He could have prevented it if he had moved more resolutely to modernize the anemic state-regulated economy while maintaining tighter controls on the political system. “The collapse of the Soviet Union was one of those occasions in history that are believed to be unthinkable until they become inevitable,” Dmitri Trenin, director of the Moscow Carnegie Center, told The Associated Press. “The Soviet Union, whatever its long-term chances, was not destined to collapse when it happened.” In the autumn of 1991, however, the worsening economic problems and the secessionist demands of the Soviet republics made the collapse far from certain. A failed coup in August 1991 by the Communist Old Guard provided an important catalyst, dramatically eroding Gorbachev’s authority and encouraging more Soviet republics to seek independence.
The treaty
As Gorbachev was desperate to negotiate a new “trade union treaty” between the republics to preserve the USSR, he faced stiff resistance from his arch-rival, Russian Federation leader Boris Yeltsin, who was eager to take over the Kremlin and had the support of other independent leaders of Soviet republics. On December 8, the leaders of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus met in a hunting lodge, declaring the USSR dead and announcing the creation of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Two weeks later, eight other Soviet republics joined the fledgling alliance, offering Gorbachev a clear-cut choice: to step down or try to avoid the country’s disintegration by force. The Soviet leader analyzed the difficult dilemma in his memoirs, noting that an attempt to order the arrest of the leaders of the republics could have resulted in a bloodbath amid loyalties split between the military and law enforcement. “If I had decided to rely on some of the armed structures, this would inevitably have triggered an acute political conflict fraught with blood and far-reaching negative consequences,” Gorbachev wrote.
In retrospect
“I couldn’t do it: I would have stopped being myself.” What would have happened if Gorbachev had resorted to force is difficult to imagine in retrospect, noted Trenin of the Carnegie Center. “It could have sparked bloody events in Moscow and all over Russia, maybe all over the Soviet Union, or it could have consolidated some things,” he said. his hands. He should have turned into some kind of dictator, because that would have … eliminated his most important element of inheritance; that is, not to use force massively. “
The winners
Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, in the 30th anniversary of the collapse of the USSR, denounced that it is precisely from that moment that the United States has become “arrogant and full of itself”, promoting the expansion of NATO to the East. “How can we count on equal relations with the US and the West from such a position? ”Gorbachev said in an interview with the Ria Novosti agency for the 30th anniversary of his resignation. The former secretary general of the PCUS thus re-launched the same considerations as the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, who insisted on asking NATO and Washington for “legally binding security guarantees” on military maneuvers and the deployment of weapons in Eastern Europe. In the interview, Gorbachev, 90, recalled “the triumphant attitude in the West, especially in the USA”, after the end of the USSR, in 1991 and denounced: “They have become arrogant and full of themselves and have declared victory in the Cold War”. The winners, continued the former Soviet leader and father of perestroika, “then decided to build a new empire and hence the idea of NATO expansion”. Finally, Gorbachev welcomed the upcoming security talks between Moscow and Washington, which should take place in Geneva and January. “I hope they bring results,” he hoped.