The Failure Of The Soviet Union

My cherished friend, I regret to inform you that our beloved Soviet society has ceased to exist. Our solid red flag with its magnificent gold emblem of the hammer and sickle flew above the Kremlin for the very last time on Christmas day, 1991. Prior to this gloomy day, eleven of the fifteenth Soviet republics that once made up the strong and prosperous Soviet Union, met in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan, to announce that they would no longer partake in the Soviet Union, and had created a Commonwealth of independent states. Our Baltic brothers: Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia were the first to break apart, while Georgia remained as the last republic in the Soviet Union. I have served the Soviet Union as Minister of Foreign Affairs

World leaders are leaders with high governmental power in the world. Every leader, not just world leaders, is either great or corrupt; they are rarely both. Most of Russia’s history is filled with corrupt leaders. Joseph was one of those leaders. Stalin killed millions of people during his rule. But Stalin also led the Soviet Union almost to the top in world power. Stalin had many influences that led him to his Soviet Leadership in which gave him many admirers but even more non-supporters.

The Soviet Union, which was once a world superpower in the 19th century saw itself in chaos going into the 20th century. These chaoses were marked by the new ideas brought in by the new leaders who had emerged eventually into power. Almost every aspect of the Soviet Union was crumbling at this period both politically and socially, as well as the economy. There were underlying reasons for the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union and eventually Eastern Europe. The economy is the most significant aspect of every government. The soviet economy was highly centralized with a “command economy” (p.1. fsmitha.com), which had been broken down due to its complexity and centrally controlled with corruption involved in it. A strong government

Communism is a system of social organisation which formerly consumed almost a third of countries in the entire world, having originated in Russia. The first official communist state was founded during the Russian revolutions in 1917, due to the inaugural communist political party ‘Bolsheviks’ gaining primal power. Afterwards, the influence of communism spread to other countries with the likes of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia and East Germany to name a few. These countries that were governed on communist principles were known as the ‘Eastern Bloc’. Even countries in Asia were persuaded into the theoretically human equality system such as China, Laos and Vietnam. Communism was gathering strength to strength every year in the mid 20th century, but eventually its impact was wiped off in the late 20th century when the Berlin War was knocked down in 1989, ending the barrier between the Eastern and Western blocs. Communism arguably was the most influential social experiment in history, but also the most flawed and its failure to change the world permanently will always remain significant in history.

Firstly, background to the rise of the Soviet Union is examined. Keenan states that the Communists rose to power on ideas which denounced capitalism and

In the 1900’s Russia was a world superpower. But the only port, Port Vladivostok, was only accessible in the summer seasons of Russia. But Japan’s fort, Fort Arthur, was open all year long. Russia, who looking to expand out farther, asked Japan if they could use Fort Arthur for their Navy, and maritime trades. Russia even went as far as to set up a neutral buffer zone in North Korea on the 39th parallel to negotiate. Japan however misunderstood this and took it as a threat, bombing their own fort, and starting the first great war of the 20th century.

Stalin grad 1942 a bloody battle was going on between the Soviet Union and the Nazi’s the tale you are about to hear is what actually happened that event in 1942.

The many long-term internal causes of the collapse of the Soviet Union centralized around weaknesses in their economy. They had an inflexible central planning system, the inability to modernize, and the inefficiency in their agriculture production. Sometime around the 1970's the computer and automation revolution had emerged. This revolution took over the West, but practically missed the Soviet Union, except in the military sector (Baylis & Smith, 2001.) Gorbachev's goal in economic restructuring was to create a separation between the economic and the political. The major changes began with the legalization of private farming and business co-operatives, and the allowing of foreign company ownership over Soviet enterprises (Baylis &Smith, 2001) All of Gorbachev's ideas on economic restructuring backfired on him since the price levels were inconsistent, and a sense of social confusion about the future of their state was created.

The Soviet Union hope to attain the “New Soviet Man”, but in their attempts only made their state situation much more dreadful by causing severe fragmentation within several ethnic groups, politics, as well as the army. This cast upon the Soviets a very bad image, which when the Soviet Union applied more tension, made their situation only worse. The Soviet Union became such a fragmented Union that Gorbachev could no longer control the power of the population and was forced to resign, and hence the fall of the Soviet Union. Political and Ethnic fragmentation contributed to the disintegration of the Soviet Union by causing division in leadership, “This division within the Soviet leadership weakened its ability to respond to centrifugal forces and contributed to the central authorities erratic response to them”(Hunter et.al, 212), as well as prove that the “New Soviet Man” was socially untenable, “The notion that nationalities would willingly give up their cultural identities for the common good, and that a unique soviet man would emerge- was socially untenable.”(Xenakis,

Seriously, the USSR was not communist or socialist. Conversely, the USSR was actually capitalist since bureaucrats privately owned the means of production. When collectivist societies have existed, they fell from external forces.

The fall of the Soviet Union, rise of democratic capitalism, and the emergence of the Internet are all important attributes that define the year 2000 as the end of one period in history and the beginning of another. The year 2000 proves to be a cut-off date in history because it explicitly shows a shift toward the continuing globalization and integrations of economies, politics, people, and cultures all around the world. This process of globalization leads to increasing interdependence among countries and growing influence of the United States of America, which during this time period was the only superpower left in the world.

of the common wealth, more or less according to their need." In 1917 the rise

On December eighteenth 1879 in Gori, Georgia, Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili (Joseph Stalin) was born into a large family. Stalin had two brothers, Georgy Jughashvili, born one year before Stalin, and Mikhail Jughashvili, born three years before Stalin. Stalin's father, Besarion Jughashvili was a cobbler though later became an alcoholic later becoming a vagrant. Stalin’s mother, Ketevan Geladze worked as a washerwoman.

During the times of the industrial revolution, the idea of communism was very popular, and for good measure. While the factory owners are sitting back and collecting their riches, men, women and children are working 18 hour days in unfathomable working conditions. This uneven distribution of wealth evoked government intervention and prevented monopolies from further dominating the economic world. During the 20th century, a plethora of countries had declared themselves as communist, though only five remain today. There have been countries that have tried this form of government. The results of these countries’ experiences with communism were largely unsuccessful. When Russia became communists, it

Under Mikhail Gorbachev the Soviet Union underwent massive social, political and economic reform that drifted away from communist ideology and this ultimately lead to the collapse of the Soviet Union and failure of communism in Eastern Europe. This essay will focus on how the Perestroika reform and Glasnost policy programs as well as other external and internal pressures contributed to the failure of communism under Gorbachev. The aim of the Perestroika and Glasnost reforms was to restructure and strengthen the Soviet political and economic system and provide more freedom and democracy within the Soviet Union while strengthening Communism. However, these changes had achieved exactly what they aimed to prevent when they were first elaborated and led to the failure of communism and collapse of the Soviet Union. While focusing on the policies this essay will also focus on the major increase in nationalism that occurred in the Soviet Republics as a result of the Glasnost. External pressure from the western world was also a factor and the role that the United States and the Ronald Reagan administration played in the downfall of communism under Gorbachev will be examined. The essay will also discuss how the disintegration of Yugoslavia and the 1991 Coup d’état led to the failure of the policies and failure of communism.