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Last Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev, Who Ended the Cold War, Dies Aged 91 (reuters.com) 143

Mikhail Gorbachev, who ended the Cold War without bloodshed but failed to prevent the collapse of the Soviet Union, died on Tuesday at the age of 91. Reuters reports: "Mikhail Gorbachev passed away tonight after a serious and protracted disease," Interfax news agency cited Russia's Central Clinical Hospital as saying in a statement. Gorbachev will be buried in Moscow's Novodevichy Cemetery next to his wife Raisa, who died in 1999, said Tass news agency, citing the foundation that the former Soviet leader set up once he left office.

Gorbachev, the last Soviet president, forged arms reduction deals with the United States and partnerships with Western powers to remove the Iron Curtain that had divided Europe since World War Two and bring about the reunification of Germany. [...] When pro-democracy protests swept across the Soviet bloc nations of communist Eastern Europe in 1989, he refrained from using force -- unlike previous Kremlin leaders who had sent tanks to crush uprisings in Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968.

But the protests fueled aspirations for autonomy in the 15 republics of the Soviet Union, which disintegrated over the next two years in chaotic fashion. Gorbachev struggled in vain to prevent that collapse. "The era of Gorbachev is the era of perestroika, the era of hope, the era of our entry into a missile-free world ... but there was one miscalculation: we did not know our country well," said Vladimir Shevchenko, who headed Gorbachev's protocol office when he was Soviet leader. "Our union fell apart, that was a tragedy and his tragedy," RIA news agency cited him as saying.

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Last Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev, Who Ended the Cold War, Dies Aged 91

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  • by ihaveamo ( 989662 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @05:05PM (#62837757)
    I think it's just not just Gorby who's passed away after a serious and protracted disease - but all of Russia.
    • Gorbachev represented some kind of empathetic kindness for the Russian nation, which definitely has disappeared. Russian chauvinism has taken over.
      • Gorbachev was a committed Communist who did his best to keep the Soviet Union going.
        He is seen as some sort of statesman in the West, because he tried to end the Cold War but the reality is that he was a hapless fool who didn't really understand what was happening.
        • by raymorris ( 2726007 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @10:22PM (#62838415) Journal

          Gorbachev was the leading figure of Perestroika, the movement to restructure the Soviet economy and government more along western lines. In other words, he's responsible for getting rid of communism in the USSR, to the extent they did gradually transition from communism.

          In the 1970s he had become very aware of problems of inefficiency and corruption inherent in the authoritarian Soviet system. He was also of course aware that when the government is running all of the businesses, the whole economy (Communism), that kinda necessitates a giant bureaucracy that's authoritarian almost by definition.

          At first, he hoped to break up the government into smaller, more nimble pieces, and therefore allow communism to work without the large, authoritarian central bureaucracy. Then Reagan came on the scene and Cold War fundamentally changed. I had the good fortune to be present in the room in 2001 Gorbachev was discussing this.

          Reagan took a tact of direct and fierce economic competition. Straight up capitalism* vs communism bare knuckle cage fight. Gorbachev was not a stupid man. He saw how that was going. He saw the US system out producing the USSR by far in all new technologies, and producing twice as many goods overall. He couldn't avoid seeing it; trying to out-compete Reagan and the US was his daily job.

          Seeing that, he introduced a new law that fundamentally changed the way the Soviet Union had worked since 1927. For the first time, groups of private individuals could decide all on their own to form and own a business together. "The people" actually owning the means of production directly, rather than only nominally while it's actually controlled by the politicians. You are a couple friends could open a restaurant and actually own the restaurant, rather than having the government own and control it. This is the system he saw working so well in the US, the corporation system.

          Gorbachev more than anyone else brought American-style private ownership to the Soviet Union. Trying to *transition* between those two very different systems didn't go much better than one might expect from such a radical change, at a time when the old system was crumbling.

          * Above I called it capitalism for poetic brevity, but it was actually the later system that evolved from both socialism and capitalism - a system in which the people can voluntarily CHOOSE to own the means of production together, banding together to own a factory or ship or whatever, the corporate system.

          • The experience of the Soviet Empire of Eastern Europe was that communism could be ended and capitalism reintroduced with a good outcome quite fast; the present prosperity of those former enslaved states demonstrates that. Sadly the Russian solution did not work as well, and Yeltsin's choice of Putin as successor has proved horribly disastrous.

            • As we see every communist country completely collapse, habe we now learned thast communism is unsustainable?
              • Cuba and North Korea keep the Red Flag flying, although not with any great success. Sadly for their citizens it hasn't collapsed there.

                And it's worth pointing out that Israeli Kibbutzim prove that collective production can work if it's small scale, strongly motivated and voluntary.

          • by Kisai ( 213879 ) on Wednesday August 31, 2022 @02:20AM (#62838683)

            One could make the argument that the stupid USSR pointing a gun at the US and vice versa is what kept US corruption in check. Without the threat of a potential nuclear war at a moments notice, the US stopped thinking it's the world police, and allowed corruption to pretty much steam roll over itself. Wealth inequality skyrocketed, climate change skyrocketed, and now we're in this protracted state of emergency against an enemy that half the US populace puts their fingers in their ears about.

            Would we have been better off had the cold war never ended? Chances are China would have never opened up, and the UK would have been less in a hurry to de-colonize. But let's say that the USSR dissolved in 2001 rather than 1991. This would have been under the backdrop of 9/11 instead of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. Chances are nearly everything would have happened the same way, but the former USSR would have started from an even deeper economic crisis, and would have been a decade too late to get into the internet.

            There's plenty of pivotal points in time, had the USSR broken up in 1979, at the peak of the oil crisis and the Three Mile Island meltdown, chances are the Chernobyl accident wouldn't have happened at all, and nuclear energy wouldn't have been so pooh-poohed as hard as it is now. Hell, Ukraine might be the world leader in nuclear power now, and maybe climate change would have been slowed down.

            It's all a matter of perspective. The most critical events that lead to the break up the USSR were economic-focused, but you can't say Chernobyl wasn't indirectly responsible for it.

            And here we are in 2022, seeing the consequences of a Russian military that has not been told basic nuclear safety training, irradiating themselves around the Chernobyl plant, fighting around another nuclear plant. Like it's not a far fetched thing to assume that Russia would like to cause a false-flag nuclear incident to justify their "involvement" in taking over Ukraine, but it's also not that far fetched that a third party would like to stir the pot and set off a nuclear incident to keep the war going.

            • by sg_oneill ( 159032 ) on Wednesday August 31, 2022 @03:13AM (#62838783)

              I'd argue Citizens United was what undid the united states.

              Once the supreme court decided money=speech and therefore you cant make laws restricting the buying and selling of political influence, it was all over. Although the laundry list of american problems is long (what is UP with political judge appointments america? The idea that judges can belong to political parties is repugnant) this particular one was what opened the flood doors imho.

              What passes as the normal business of politics in the united states would have the anti corruption cops kicking down doors anywhere else in the western world.

              • Once the supreme court decided money=speech and therefore you cant make laws restricting the buying and selling of political influence, it was all over.

                Yes, and it's astounding to me that the whole "money=speech" argument got so much traction. The obvious conclusion being that it grants the rich rights to much more (and influential) speech than the poor.

                • Citizen's united is such a misunderstood ruling.

                  The government blew the argument. They were winning until one justice asked something like "So, if I want to publish a book about a politician a month before election that would reveal bad information about that politician, would the government be allowed to block the publication of that book?"

                  And the answer from the government was: Why yes, of course.

                  And ... poof. It's gone. And for good reason (on that reason).

                  Then all the rest is just ... political man

                • The argument is that printing a pamphlet or hosting a web site does cost money. Exercising your free speech rights on any scale cost money when Benjamin Franklin printed pamphlets criticizing the king, and that hasn't changed.

                  The Obama administrations argument that you aren't allowed to make copies of a pamphlet that's critical of him, because making copies costs money, was just a ridiculous argument. It's just Trump-level ludicrous. OF COURSE you buy SD cards to use for making a video about how crappy Trum

              • I'd argue Citizens United was what undid the united states.

                Once the supreme court decided money=speech and therefore you cant make laws restricting the buying and selling of political influence, it was all over. Although the laundry list of american problems is long (what is UP with political judge appointments america? The idea that judges can belong to political parties is repugnant) this particular one was what opened the flood doors imho.

                What passes as the normal business of politics in the united states would have the anti corruption cops kicking down doors anywhere else in the western world.

                The Civil Rights Act is what undid the United States.

                Before that the US effectively had 3 parties, Northern Democrats, Southern Democrats, and Republicans. Especially since the Democratic party was split it helped prevent complete polarization.

                The Civil Rights act wiped out the Southern Democrats and simplified the political debate down to two clearly defined parties, it also gave Republicans the opportunity to try and become the party of white people. The moment that happened it was inevitable that one wou

              • Before Citizens United, it was fucking obvious to everyone that OF COURSE Michael Moore's company can make a movie criticizing Bush. That's whole freaking point of the first amendment.

                How far back does this idea go? At least to Benjamin Franklin's publishing house printing handbills talking shit about the king. In the Constitution the founding fathers guaranteed your right and mine to keep doing what they had been doing.

                Over 200 years later, Michael Moore was carrying on the fine American tradition (will a

                • Actually- governments have been incredibly inconsistent since Julius Caesar on whether or not a corporation is a person, or just a representative "DBA-Doing Business As" the stockholders of that corporation.

                  In the United States- Southern Pacific Railroad vs Santa Clara County over the problem of charging a corporation property taxes is what settled the issue. Corporations are people, period. There are some of us who still think this is an error- for the meaning of the word "limited" in "limited liability"

              • (what is UP with political judge appointments america? The idea that judges can belong to political parties is repugnant)

                Absolutely agree wholeheartedly! It's the same here in Switzerland and the crazy thing is, the Swiss see nothing wrong with it...

              • I'd argue Citizens United was what undid the united states. Once the supreme court decided money=speech ...

                That's not what Citizen's United said, that's how the losing side erroneously characterized the ruling. Have you read the ruling? I have.

                What the Citizen's United ruling actually says is that:
                (1) Groups of people have the same free speech rights are individual persons. That the nature of the group, union, activist group, corporation, etc does not matter.
                (2) Media corporations do not have any special rights to speech. Every corporation has the same speech rights as media and news corporations.

                Go read

            • by drnb ( 2434720 )

              One could make the argument ...

              And be wrong.

              ... that the stupid USSR pointing a gun at the US and vice versa is what kept US corruption in check.

              That threat is one of various factors that enabled corruption. It rationalized bad behaviors as helping the anti-communist effort so lets give them a pass.

              Without the threat of a potential nuclear war at a moments notice, the US stopped thinking it's the world police, and allowed corruption to pretty much steam roll over itself.

              More corruption was inevitable as more self-absorbed generations came to power.

              Wealth inequality skyrocketed, climate change skyrocketed, ...

              Primarily due to those outside the US. Billions of people moving into the middle class globally and wanting their part of the good life.

              ... Would we have been better off had the cold war never ended? Chances are China would have never opened up, ...

              China opening up was due to the Cold War, to play china against the USSR. It was based on the 1960s/70s Nixon/Kissenger theory

        • I'm pretty sure he understood exactly what was happening but also was out of options. Basically he was like a surgeon noticing his patient goes into cardiac arrest and trying a last ditch effort to save his life.

          Yes, he failed, but the alternative would have been to pull an Chernenko: Sit there, do nothing and watch it fall apart.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by TigerPlish ( 174064 )

      The cancer in Russia was introduced in October, 1917. Removal of that particular cancer in 1991 is what ultimately caused the death. In between was nearly 80 years of non-stop bad for the Russian people.

      It still hasn't recovered. It may never will, attempts by Putin to revive the Big Bad Bear notwithstanding.

      And to think some want to bring that here. Tthe very phrase "Politically Correct" is Soviet in nature..

      • by mrclevesque ( 1413593 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @05:59PM (#62837903)

        > the very phrase "Politically Correct" is Soviet..

        " 'Politically Correct': The Phrase Has Gone From Wisdom To Weapon " + "Since as far back as 1793, when the term appeared in a U.S. Supreme Court decision about the boundaries of federal jurisdiction, "politically correct" has had an array of definitions."

        https://www.npr.org/sections/c... [npr.org]

      • by hey! ( 33014 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @07:10PM (#62838111) Homepage Journal

        Actually that's a bit of an over simplification. Remember, what came before the USSR was Imperial Russia, and that sucked for a lot of people too. We may no longer have a regime based on harebrained Utopian economic ideas in Russia, but we *don't* have anything like the rule of law. It's more like a return to the Imperial system. Putin rules like a Tsar and his oligarchs and loyal state functionaries are his boyars who enrich themselves by their dependence on his power.

        So you could argue the "cancer" goes all the way back to the Tatars. Why is *Moscow* the de facto power center of the Slavic world, and not Kyiv or Novgorod, which have longer histories as important religious and political centers? Because the Dukes of Moscow and their boyars were the tax collectors of the Tatars. When the khanate was weakened by internal divisions the Muscovites expelled them, then carried on bleeding people dry. And that has how things have been ever since. You can see how the idea of historical determinism seemed plausible in the Soviet Union, in that an arguably much more functional state replaced a dysfunctional medieval system. But what really happens in that part of the world is that whenever a regime loses grip on power it topples, because almost nobody feels any loyalty to their rulers, who are parasites.

        Which brings this back to Gorbachev, I think his ultimate failure as a leader was that he actually believed in the system. The General Secretary of the Soviet Union was very powerful, but he was far from an autocrat; there were other important power centers, particularly the Politburo. This is how Khrushchev got removed; he didn't watch the Politburo closely enough and they formed a consensus behind his back to fire him. So to survive as a General Secretary you needed to be a ruthlessly cynical power player. Gorbachev allowed perestroika and glasnost because he was out of touch; he had no idea how little many people actually *wanted* to be part of the Soviet Union, particularly after Afghanistan.

        • Why is *Moscow* the de facto power center of the Slavic world, and not Kyiv or Novgorod, which have longer histories as important religious and political centers?

          Better hope the defensive nukes still work, or the way things are going Kyiv will again be the political center.

          Which brings this back to Gorbachev, I think his ultimate failure as a leader was that he actually believed in the system

          To be fair, it wasn't an easy task.
          To be harsh, anyone who gets to the top of an organization through political skill tends to lack practical skill.

          • by edis ( 266347 )

            All was easy by the time, he inherited it. It was pretty stale. There is another word, which emerged and was characteristic: zastoy. Gorby wished, he could kick it to some new lease of life. But the whole thing was assembled and held together with terror, which made it fall apart before anything else.

            It is not quite true, this went without the spill of the blood. Here and there militant empowered would grab controls from Gorby and impose convulsions of terror. Yet his was the new order, that terror is not t

            • Yet his was the new order, that terror is not to be priority anymore. Well, that was impotence of Brezhnev's continuing, to be exact.

              I don't think terror is the way to go anyway. Mutual support is better. Bakunin was right.

              • by edis ( 266347 )

                And down there you'll find on support of the West.
                Far from mutual, astonishingly stupid ignorance.

                • Yeah. Russians don't know how to do "win-win" agreements.

                  • by edis ( 266347 )

                    For their defense, they had agreement of freezing NATO perimeter, very insightful.
                    The West did disappoint once again. Leaving junk as putin with an argument.

                    So, do not put all the blame on Russians.

                    • by edis ( 266347 )

                      Nobody agreed to freeze NATO's perimeter. They said that they had no plans to expand NATO towards the Soviet Union. Which was true. But A. the Soviet Union no longer exists, so even if there had been such an agreement, any treaty with it is presumptively null and void

                      Nope. Promise of not expanding towards USSR was demanded, and provided, before demolition of Berlin wall could be agreed with. This is some cornerstone to be obeyed. It simply does not go like that in politics, when one power would "just say", politics are not happening like that. The West was way too ignorant after getting the deal. And yes, I wholeheartedly support choice of the countries to get protection of any sort, other than protection by bigger brother nearby. My country is one, lucky to succeeding

        • by Tom ( 822 )

          But what really happens in that part of the world is that whenever a regime loses grip on power it topples, because almost nobody feels any loyalty to their rulers, who are parasites.

          Which is true almost everywhere in the world, but in different shapes.

          In most dictatorships and pseudo-democracies, people don't care who rules as long as their taxes don't rise. They feel no connection to their government anyways.

          Even in most western countries, only a fraction of the population is politically active and cares much about who actually runs the country. Anyway, political parties have become interchangeable and politicians are all corrupt. It's rare that the public at large feels strongly abou

      • Can you imagine how much worse things were in Russia before 1917?
        The vast majority of citizens of the Russian Empire supported the Reds, and even France, Britain and the US invading in support of the Whites couldn't save them.

        They must have been awful.

        • by edis ( 266347 )

          You have it wrong, I guess. Russia was siding with allies in the war of that time, and Germany was sponsoring the coup, but foreigners generally were not representative on the soil of that particular empire.

          The world was in anticipation of new era, though, it was in the air. Pity, the amount of brutality ahead was hardly accounted. The war has already made folks tired, anything was appearing as a solution.

      • by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Wednesday August 31, 2022 @03:07AM (#62838765)

        It's not really that simple. Russia is suffering from pretty much the same problem Germany did in the 1930s.

        Russia until 1917 was ruled a despotic, autocratic regime. It's no exaggeration to say that the average Russian "peasant" was living in a situation that is not far from what is essentially slavery. The local aristocrats pretty much owned their subjects and could do whatever they please. Europe wasn't exactly the epitome of democracy in the 19th century either, aside of the parlamentarian monarchy of England and the mostly-kinda republic of France, there were a bunch of monarchies, most of them what was termed "enlightened absolutist" rules, most of them having some kind of democratic tendencies and some sort of participation of the population, but Russia remained an autocratic monarchy with zero popular participation.

        The Russian revolution changed one autocratic rule for another one. Believe it or not, it was actually better for the average peasant because they were still not free in any sense we'd consider, but the people at least were no longer officially owned.

        Russians never experienced a moment of freedom until the fall of the Iron Curtain. And the "freedom" they got then was pretty much anarchy. What followed the iron fist of the Soviets was mob rule. Not liberal freedom. The mafia pretty much ran the country. The police was pretty much ineffective for anything. You could be robbed in plain daylight and nobody gave half a fuck about it.

        So Russia is back to autocracy, and the people actually like it. Because it's still better than what they got before. Not that it's good, don't get me wrong, and I have no doubt that Russians know that it's not "good". It's very much like Germany 1930. Germany, too, went from autocracy to militaristic autocracy to anarchy to kleptocracy.

        It's no wonder that they would say that Hitler actually was the lesser evil. Like Putin is now.

        Russia needs a reset. Just like Germany did back then. And a role model that shows them how it can be better. Unfortunately, the "free" world isn't exactly a really good role model right now either.

  • Anyone know the Reported Cause of Death.

    On one hand, he was 91.

    On the other hand. . .

    • by suss ( 158993 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @05:09PM (#62837767)

      Wolves. He was delicious.

  • by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @05:18PM (#62837791)

    For whatever reason, I assumed he had died many years ago.

  • goodbye (Score:5, Informative)

    by phantomfive ( 622387 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @05:36PM (#62837841) Journal

    Goodbye old comrade. Wish you had dealt with the corruption.

    Glad you didn't kill a bunch of people.

    • Re:goodbye (Score:4, Informative)

      by lorinc ( 2470890 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @05:53PM (#62837879) Homepage Journal

      Well he did. He did in Chernobyl by having people stay there to show that it wasn't dangerous. He also did have the military shoot when people started to demonstrate during the fall of the USSR. He had opponents deported, in pure soviet tradition. Granted, he didn't kill many by Russian standards and it's difficult to know what was his decision and what was the KGB and the military decision that he could not act against.

      • Re:goodbye (Score:4, Informative)

        by phantomfive ( 622387 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @06:24PM (#62838005) Journal

        He let the Berlin wall fall and those protests happen without shooting.

        • by lorinc ( 2470890 )

          Being born in East-Germany, I know that very well! I'm glad he didn't order the Russian troops stationed in GDR to open fire, for sure! But let's not make him the hero of democracy he never was. Gorbi wasn't a democrat, he was a bureaucrat overwhelmed with events happening at a speed he could not comprehend. Did he let everything happen with minimal killing because he was a pacifist or was it because he was too slow to order the massive killing? I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, but that's i

          • Did he let everything happen with minimal killing because he was a pacifist or was it because he was too slow to order the massive killing?

            He didn't want to kill the people. That doesn't exactly make a person a pacifist, but he didn't want to mass slaughter civilians.

      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        The evacuation in Chernobyl should have started long before it even came to Gorbachev's attention. By the time he was briefed on the full extent of it, it was already too late.

        What he was responsible for was overseeing the use of human beings to first avoid a huge nuclear explosion when the melting down reactors reached the water table, and secondly when he signed off on using "bio robots" to clear extremely dangerous debris and prepare the site for construction of a containment structure. To be fair to him

    • > Goodbye old comrade. Wish you had dealt with the corruption.

      He certainly tried to. He saw that it destroying the country. That's what Glasnost was all about. He saw very clearly that a huge central bureaucracy running every business and deciding every purchase in the whole country was of course a breeding ground for corruption. His challenge is that communism on a national scale, having the bureaucrats in charge of everything that touches money or the economy, REQUIRES an enormous, authoritarian govern

    • I had the good fortune to be in the room with Gorbachev in 2001. The phrasing he used at one point caught my attention.

      In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Gorbachev was trying to transition the country to a different form of economy and significantly reform the government. (Perestroika and Glasnost). While the country kept operating, of course. This can be compared to trying to start with an half-running old pickup and rebuild it as a hot rod *while it's driving down the road*.

      Someone asked Gorbachev about h

  • Ended Cold War eh (Score:4, Insightful)

    by oumuamua ( 6173784 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @06:15PM (#62837965)
    Well Cold War is back baby!
    Maybe the West should have been more friendly to Gorbachev when he was in power :

    With the Soviet budget deficit climbing and no domestic money markets to provide the state with loans, Gorbachev looked elsewhere.[376] Throughout 1991, Gorbachev requested sizable loans from Western countries and Japan, hoping to keep the Soviet economy afloat and ensure the success of perestroika.[377] Although the Soviet Union had been excluded from the G7, Gorbachev secured an invitation to its London summit in July 1991.[378] There, he continued to call for financial assistance; Mitterrand and Kohl backed him,[379] while Thatcher—no longer in office— also urged Western leaders to agree.[380] Most G7 members were reluctant, instead offering technical assistance and proposing the Soviets receive "special associate" status—rather than full membership—of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.[381] Gorbachev was frustrated that the U.S. would spend $100 billion on the Gulf War but would not offer his country loans.[382]

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] hind site is 20/20

    • How was keeping the Soviet Union afloat in the interest of the West? It peacefully breaking up was the absolute best-case scenario from the point of view of the West.

      That said, I do agree the US should have done more to help Russia during the economic collapse of the 90s. It was still a massive nuclear armed state, and the cost of doing so little was that Putin was able to attain power and also convince the population that democracy/capitalism is overrated.

      • How much aid were people willing to give their former enemies? Or perhaps more importantly, how much were people willing to accept from their former enemies? On paper you're right and I wish more could have been done, but the reality is so much more complex.
    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      If there is one lesson we should have learned by now, it's that failed states are never good for us. Doesn't matter how they fail, or if it's our fault or not.

    • Why would anyone sane lend a kleptocracy money?

      There was no reason to want an intact cultural enemy.

  • ...of glowing redness a voice cries out, "Dammit, Pete! I said RUSSIAN PRESIDENT! Not SOVIET! I can't do a thing with this guy you sent down here!"

    From above the clouds a voice clears its throat and mutters, "You have no idea what your getting yourself into when I send the other guy along..."

    And God grins before going back to flicking neutrons from his thumbs like relativistic marbles...

    • by phantomfive ( 622387 ) on Tuesday August 30, 2022 @08:59PM (#62838313) Journal

      NATO never would have expanded if Russians didn't keep threatening to attack its neighbors. Why do you think Turkey is part of NATO?

      • by qaz123 ( 2841887 )
        What does Turkey have to do with NATO expansion after the fall of the Soviet Union? Turkey became a NATO member in 1952
        • by mjwx ( 966435 )

          What does Turkey have to do with NATO expansion after the fall of the Soviet Union? Turkey became a NATO member in 1952

          Terrible example, but a good point.

          Think more of the Nordic states. Finland is fiercely independent, but the invasion of Ukraine showed that the Russians were both aggressive and not as strong as they made out to be. For years Finland resisted the idea of joining NATO despite being culturally and economically close to the western powers, partially because of their independent streak and partially because they didn't want to upset Russia. With the Ukraine invasion, the Finns cant join NATO fast enough. T

        • Turkey joined NATO because Russia threatened to invade them.

          What does the fall of the Soviet Union have to do with it? Russia was the same before and after: they continued to threaten to invade their neighbors, as they have threatened and done for hundreds of years.

      • by sd4f ( 1891894 )
        The only border that is satisfactory to Russia is one with Russian soldiers on both sides.
        • Though to be fair, that would be anyone's preference. "Trusted friend and ally" is a close runner up, but anyone that isn't you is a potential, if not actual, threat.
          • Though to be fair, that would be anyone's preference.

            Maybe. Americans don't want soldiers on the Canadian side of the border. Belgium doesn't seem to want soldiers on the French side of their border.

            Russians want that kind of thing because they have trust issues.

      • NATO never would have expanded if Russians didn't keep threatening to attack its neighbors. Why do you think Turkey is part of NATO?

        Bullshit. Russia was as weak as a kitten for almost a decade after the Soviet Union fell.

        NATO expanded because NATO is the European arm of the American Empire. And Empires want to expand, not shrink. In the words of Madeleine Albright, Clinton's SecState, "What's the point of having all these expensive weapons if we can't use them?" NATO was constantly finding new justifications to exist all throughout the 90's, missions that had not a damn thing to do with its purpose of defending against a nation that did

        • Bullshit. Russia was as weak as a kitten for almost a decade after the Soviet Union fell.

          Russian imperialism never died. Russia never stopped threatening its neighbors.

          Again, answer the question: why did Turkey join NATO? If you don't know, you're ignorant.

        • NATO never would have expanded if Russians didn't keep threatening to attack its neighbors. Why do you think Turkey is part of NATO?

          Bullshit. Russia was as weak as a kitten for almost a decade after the Soviet Union fell.

          A kitten with Nuclear arms... but the freed members of the USSR were even weaker due to decades of Russian exploitation so they had very good reason to feel afraid.

          NATO expanded because NATO is the European arm of the American Empire. And Empires want to expand, not shrink. In the words of Madeleine Albright, Clinton's SecState, "What's the point of having all these expensive weapons if we can't use them?" NATO was constantly finding new justifications to exist all throughout the 90's, missions that had not a damn thing to do with its purpose of defending against a nation that didn't even exist anymore.

          NATO expanded because everyone knew that Russia had a history of imperialism. And there would obviously be an element within Russia that would want to retake territories they controlled under the USSR.

          The only way a country being a member of NATO hurts Russia is by taking away Russia's ability to intimidate that country with threats of war.

  • Media Darling Mikhail Gorbachev — the only likable Soviet leader in the entire history of the Soviet Union — induces his last Western media Gorbasim.

    So long Mike. You weren't half the man necessary to get the kleptocrats and vodka swillers under control, and your nation is no better for your efforts. It takes more than feels to un-fuck a shithole like Russia.

  • Way better than the current situation.
  • He shouldn't. He was not trying to end it, he simply lost it as the inherent flaws of the Socialist system became unmanageable. If anyone deserves the credit, it would be his opponents in the West.
    • He shouldn't. He was not trying to end it, he simply lost it as the inherent flaws of the Socialist system became unmanageable. If anyone deserves the credit, it would be his opponents in the West.

      Yep. Ending the Soviet Union was the last thing he ever wanted to do. He wanted to repair and strengthen it, and he though liberalization was the way to do that. He found out that you can't transform a nation that was literally born with the idea that, in order to save the masses, you have to keep them in a constant state of terror:

      ""The state is an institution built up for the sake of exercising violence. Previously, this violence was exercised by a handful of moneybags over the entire people; now we want

  • Unfortunately, Russia is just chock-full of Russians, and Russians have for many centuries gravitated to warlords and totalitarian rulers. It's in the DNA figuratively and literally, and Russia is currently merely reverting to type. Do not be fooled by a small contingent of intellectuals and Youtube creators -- take a look at your average Ivan.

Veni, Vidi, VISA: I came, I saw, I did a little shopping.

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