chapter 16. Communist Rule in the USSR, lowe notes

16. Communist Rule in the USSR
1924-1991

Summary of events

This period in the history of the USSR falls into 4 phases

1924-53

· Stalin was the dominant figure (1924-1953, he was 73)
· When Lenin died 24’ it was expected that Trotskij would become leader, but Stalin won the “competition”.
· Back then tremendous problems faced young Russia:
Industry and agriculture were backward and inefficient
Constant food shortages that pressed social and political problems
Many Russians were afraid that some capitalist power would try to destroy the new communist state

· Stalin’s efforts to overcome these problems were:

Five Year Plans to revolutionize industry
Collectivization of agriculture
Introduction of totalitarian regime (more ruthless than Hitler’s system)


1953-1964

Nikita Khrushchev was leader under this period. He began a de- Stalinization policy and made some progress in improving living standards


1964- 1985

Was a period of stagnation and decline, the leader was Brezhnev

1985-1991

· Gorbachev tried to reform and modernize Russian communism and encouraged the same things in the satellite states
· He was unable to control the rising tide of criticism of communism, so 90-91 non communists governments were established in E. Europe
· When Gorbatchev failed the promises of economic reform and high living standards, people turned against him
· He lost power to Yeltsin, the communist party was declared illegal, USSR broke up in 15 different states and he resigned


16.1 How did Stalin manage to get supreme power?

· His real name is Joseph Djugashvilli (Stalin means man of steel), and he was born in 79 in Georgia
· He studied Theology 4 years but was expelled because his spreading of socialist ideas.
· He fixed his position under Lenin (17’) because his outstanding ability as an administrator
· After Lenin’s death (24’), most obvious successor was Trotskij but eventually Stalin succeeded to eliminate his rivals and became leader, Trotskij considered him as unable to cope with a leadership.

a) Trotsky’s brilliance worked against him

· Concurrency arose between the members of the Politburo. They were in the number of eight; some had a dislike to Stalin and thought that he was new and arrogant. Others wanted to lead Russian together.
· One thing was certain, everybody worked together to prevent Trotskij from becoming a leader

b) The other Politburo members underestimated Stalin

· Everybody ignored Lenin’s advice about removing him and they saw him as nothing more than a competent administrator

b) Stalin used his position

· He used his power of promotion and appointment to win supporters and remove the other’s supporters

c) Stalin used disagreements to his own benefit

· There were disagreements in the Politburo over policy because Marx had never described in detail exactly how the new communist society should be organized
· The politburo became divided unofficially in the left wing and the right wing, with Bukharin on the right and Trotskij, Kamenev and Zinoviev on the left

· The right wanted to continue NEP, even though it was causing an increase of the pulaks that were considered enemies of communism. Bukharin considered this important because it was important to merge soviet power in Russia, based on prosperous peasantry with a very gradual industrialization.
· The left, with Trotskij, was not agreed with the NEP and believed in revolution outside Russia and when this was achieved the rich West would help Russia with its industrialization
· Stalin supported right, simply to isolate Trotskij. Later when a split between Bukharin, Kamenev and Zinoviev occurred, Stalin supported Bukharin and the other two were outvoted.

Later Stalin that NEP must dissolve, when Bukharin protested he was expelled

· When he reached what he wished, he attacked the problems Russia faced, they were:
A) Economic
B) Political and Social
C) Foreign


16.2 How successful was Stalin in solving Russia’s economic problems?


a) What were Russia’s economic problems?


1.

· Russia was recovering from the effects of the WW1, but the production from industry was still very low (France, Germany, Britain, USA were in front of Russia)

· Stalin was sure that he needed a rapid expansion of heavy industry to cope with the West’s attack against USSR. He was sure that this attack would occur

· Industrialization would increase the communist support, because the industrial workers were the communists’ greatest allies. The more industrial workers there were in relation to peasants (Stalin’s enemies of socialism), the more secure the communist state would be.

· One big obstacle for Stalin was the lack of capital to finance expansion. Foreign countries were unwilling to invest in a communist state.

2.

· More food had to be produced, both to feed the growing industrial population and to provide a surplus of export.
· The surplus of export would bring in foreign capital and profits for investment of industry
· The primitive agricultural system which was allowed to continue under NEP was incapable of providing such resources.












b) The approach: the Five Year Plans and collectivization

Stalin had no economic experience but he did not hesitate to start some dramatic changes that would overcome the problems in the shortest possible time.
Both industry and agriculture was taken under government control and NEP was abandoned
Stalin said (31’): we are 50 or 100 years behind other countries, we must take this distance in the next 10 years

The Five Year Plan

· Industrial expansion was tackled by a series of Five Year Plans, the first two were said to have been completed a year before schedule (28-32 and 33-37), although they did not reach the target.

· The first plan was concentrated on heavy industry (coal, iron, steel, oil and machinery as tractors). These were scheduled to triple output


· The two later plans provided some increases in consumer goods and heavy industry
· The plans were remarkable. In 1940 USSR had overtaken Britain in iron and steel production (not yet in coal) and on her way to reach Germany

· Hundreds of factories were built, many of them in new towns east of Ural Mountains where they would be safer from invasion

How was this achieved?

The cash was provided almost entirely by the Russians themselves, with no foreign investment
The cash came from:
Grain exports

Charging peasants heavily for use of government equipment

Plowing back (återinvestera vinst) of all profits and surpluses
Hundreds of foreign technicians were brought in

Emphasis was placed on expanding education in colleges, factory schools and universities. This to provide skill workers

Differentials between skilled and unskilled workers, to encourage production

Life was very grim for most workers. There were severe punishments for bad workmanship. People were accused for being saboteurs when targets were not reached. This could send you in forced labor camps.

There were primitive housing conditions and food shortages as well. (because of the concentration on heavy industry)
By the mid 30s things were improving as benefits such as medical care, education and holidays with pay


Collectivization

This process dealt with problems of agriculture
The idea meant that small farms and holdings to the peasants should be merged to form large collective farms (kolkhoz) jointly owned by peasants. There were two main reasons for Stalin to do that:

The system of small farms was inefficient, whereas large farms, under state direction, and using tractors and combine harvesters, would vastly increase grain production.
He wanted to eliminate the prosperous peasants (kulaks) and NEP because they were considered enemies.
This policy was met with a lot of resistance in the countryside.


There was a problem. The landless laborers were no problem to collectivize. But all the peasants that owned any property at all (whether Kulaks or not) were hostile to the plan. To join, they had to be forced by armies of party members.
The armies urged poorer peasants to seize cattle and machinery from the kulaks to be handed over to the collectives.


When peasants refused to join they were shot or taken to labor camps.
When newly collectivized peasants tried to sabotage their system by producing only enough for their own needs, local officials insisted on seizing the required quotas.

Total grain production did not increase at all, sometimes even less. This led to famine in any areas during 32-33, especially in the Ukraine.

In one way Stalin could claim that collectivization was a success: it allowed greater mechanization that did achieve a substantial increase in production in 1937. On the other hand, so many animals were slaughtered that it was 1953 before livestock production recovered to the 1928 figure and the cost in human life and suffering was enormous.








16.3 Political and social problems and Stalin’s solutions


a) The problems

· Stalin felt that under his totalitarian regime, political and social activities must be controlled just as much as economic life.
· He wanted complete and unchallenged power and he became suspicious and intolerant of criticism

There was a growing opposition in the party; the Ryutin platform (32’) aimed to slow down industrialization, allow peasants to leave the collective farms and remove Stalin if necessary. Stalin wanted to eliminate criticism once for all.
A new constitution was needed to consolidate the hold of Stalin and the communist party over the whole country.
Social and cultural aspects of life need to be brought into line, so that he could harness them (utnyttja) to the service of the state
The non Russian parts of the country wanted to become independent but Stalin wanted to hold the Union together.

b) Stalin’s methods were typically dramatic


1. The Purges; There was a growing opposition in the party; the Ryutin platform (32’) aimed to slow down industrialization, allow peasants to leave the collective farms and remove Stalin if necessary. Stalin wanted to eliminate criticism once for all.

· The purges included that during the next four years hundreds of important officials were arrested, tortured, made to confess innocent crimes, (a good example is the plotting with the exiled Trotskij ) and forced to appear in series of “show trials”, in which people were found guilty and sentenced to death or sent to labor camps.

· Officials that were executed were: Ryutin (platform), Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bukharin and Radek.
· Estimates argue that about 8 million innocent people ended up in labor camps.
· The purges were successful in eliminating possible leaders and in terrorizing the mass into obedience. The purges were bad because many of the best brains in the government, industry and army had now disappeared. This was extremely important because Russia had a low number of educated people, something that reduced progress.

A new constitution; a new constitution was needed to consolidate the hold of Stalin and the communist party over the whole country.

· In 36’ after much discussion, a new democratic constitution was introduced in which everyone was allowed to vote by secret ballot to choose members of national assembly known as Supreme Soviet.
The democracy was only an illusion: the constitution underlined the fact that Stalin and the party ran things, and though there was mention of freedom of speech, anybody who ventured to criticize Stalin was quickly purged.


3. Social and Cultural Policies; Social and cultural aspects of life need to be brought into line, so that he could harness them (utnyttja) to the service of the state

· Writers, artists and musicians were expected to produce works of realism glorifying soviet achievements. Anyone that did not conform or did not please Stalin was executed.
· Education was watched by secret police. It deteriorated into indoctrination. Something positive was that literacy increased, and was a great achievement
· Stalin tried to clamp down the Orthodox Church, but this was a failure because in the 40s more than the half of the population was till convinced believers.


4. Holding the Union together; the non Russian parts of the country wanted to become independent but Stalin wanted to hold the Union together.

· In 1914 the tsarist empire, contained many non Russian areas. Lenin was nice to most of them; he gave Finland independence for example. Other countries gained independence as well.
· Most countries that gained independence, after a while, turned out to be anti-Bolsheviks.
· Sine Lenin gained Stalin the Commissar of Nationalities post, Stalin decided that the new post tsarist states were too much of a threat, so he forced them to become part of Russia again.
· By 1925 there were 6 soviet republics: Russia itself, Transcaucasia (Georgia, Armenia and Azerbajdjan), the Ukraine, Belorussia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan.


· The Problem for Russia was that 48% of its population was non Russian and it would be difficult to hold them together under Moscow rule. Stalin adopted a two handed approach that worked successfully until Gorbachev.

a) National cultures and languages were encouraged and the republics had a certain amount of independence
b) It had to be clear that Moscow had the final word, and if necessary force would be used.

When the Ukraine communist party said that the collectivization was a failure, Moscow carried out a purge.







c) 1945-53

After the WW2 Stalin continued to rule the USSR for 8 years.
The western half of European Russia was totally devastated but Stalin did not let any relaxation of government controls.

The economy had to be reconstructed and the FOURTH FIVE YEAR PLAN was introduced (46’) and incredibly, in those circumstances, succeeded in restoring industrial production to its 1940’ levels.

Just before Stalin would start another set of purges, to the immense relief of his associates, he died (53’)


16.4 Was the Stalin approach necessary?

There are two major views about Stalin’s successes:

Stalin’s defenders, included many Russian historians, argued that the situation was so desperate that only the pressures of brute force could have produced such a rapid industrialization, together with the necessary food. For them the supreme justification is that thanks to Stalin the Russians could resist the Germans

The opposing view, claims that Stalin’s policies were superficially successful but in reality weakened Russia because:

a) High targets for industrial production placed unnecessary pressure on the workers and led to slipshod work and poor quality products
b) The brutal enforcement of collectivization vastly reduced the amount of meat available and made peasants so bitter that in the Ukraine the German invaders were welcomed
c) The purges slowed down economic progress by removing many of the most experienced men and almost caused military defeat during the first few month of the war by removing all the great generals


The final point is that many Marxists both inside and outside Russia claimed that Stalin betrayed the idealism of Marx and Lenin.

The Russian historian Roy Medvedev argues that Stalin should not get any credit at all because instead of a new classless society in which everybody was free and equal, ordinary workers and peasants were as exploited as they had been under the tsars. The party had taken the place of the capitalists and enjoyed all the privileges, best houses and cars.

Instead of Marxism, socialism and the dictatorship of the proletariat, there was merely Stalinism and the dictatorship of Stalin.


16.5 The Khrushchev era- 53à64

a) The rise of Khrushchev 53-57’

· After Stalin’s death the situation was similar to that after Lenin’s. there was no obvious leader
· The politburo was now called as the Praesidium decided to share power and rule as a group:
Malenkov became Chairman of the Council of Ministers;
Khrushchev became Party Secretary
Voroshilov became Chairman of the Praesidium
Beria became Chief of the Secret Police, Bulganin and Molotov

Khrushchev began to emerge as the dominant personality
Beria was executed because the others were afraid of him turning against them
Malenkov resigned after disagreeing with Khrushchev about industrial policies
Khrushchev’s position was strengthened even more when in an amazing speech (56’) he criticized Stalin’s policies, he criticized that:

a) condemned Stalin for encouraging the cult of his own personality instead of allowing the party rule
b) revealed details about Stalin’s purges of the 30’s and criticized his conduct of the war
c) claimed that socialism could be achieved in other ways that those Stalin used
d) suggested that peaceful co existence with the West was not possible but essential if nuclear war was to be avoided

· Molotov and Malenkov complained about this drastic speech that would encourage unrest. However as Party Secretary, as Stalin before, Khrushchev filled key positions with own supporters (e.g. the army) and then Molotov and Malenkov found themselves retired (June 57’)
· He did not have as much power as Stalin. He and the Central Committee of the party that ruled Russia and it was the Central Committee that voted Khrushchev out in 64’.

b) Khrushchev’s problems and policies

· In spite of the recovery under the last years, there were still a number of major problems:
The low standard of living among the industrial and agricultural workers
Inefficiency of agriculture, which did not provide Russia’s needs

· Khrushchev was aware of this fact, so he considered that a general de-Stalinization policy would solve some problems.


Industrial policy

· Industry continued to be organized under Five Year Plans, but firstly they were concentrated more on light industries, producing consumer goods (radios, TV sets, washing machines etc.), just to raise living standards

· To reduce over centralization and encourage efficiency, 100 Regional Economic Council were set up to make decisions about and organize their local industries. Managers were encouraged to make profits rather then meeting quotas and wages depended on output

· This led to an improvement of living standards in 58’. However, USSR, as Khrushchev confessed, was far behind USA in the production of housing production, but soon the difference would be covered.

· An important technological progress was the first manned orbit of the earth by Gagarin (61’)


2. Agriculture Policy

· In agriculture the increase of food production raised
· Khrushchev started for the first time the virgin land schemes (54’, this would cultivate huge areas in Siberia and Kazakhstan. These peasants would be allowed to keep or sell crops from private land. The government increased its payments for the crops from collectives, in order to provide incentives to produce more.
· After a period of increased grain production, in 63’ grain output was down to 10 million mainly because of the failure of the virgin land scheme.
· The trouble was that the biggest part of the land was of bad quality, not enough fertilizers were used. In general there was still too much interference in agriculture from party officials and it remained the least efficient sector of the economy.
· The Russians had to rely on grain imports, often from the USA.


3. Political changes


· The thaw included to return to party control instead of Stalin’s personality cult, a reduction in secret police activities, and more freedom for ordinary people, more tourism, and a slight relaxation of press controls.

4. Foreign affairs


· Khrushchev aimed for a peaceful co existence and seemed prepared to allow different roads to socialism among the satellites. The departure from strict Marxist ideas (including his encouragement of profit and wage incentives) laid him open to Chinese accusations of revisionism.
· He proved this when Poland and Hungary tried to beak down Russian control, and Khrushchev’s tolerance was shown.



c) Khrushchev’s fall


· In October 1964 the Central Committee of the party voted Khrushchev into retirement on the grounds of ill health, although his health was good.
· The real reasons were probably:

The failure of his agricultural policy (they have not been worse the others)
The loss of prestige over the Cuban missile crisis
The widening breach with China, which he made no attempt to heal
His colleges were tired of his extrovert personality

16.6 The USSR stagnates


a) The Brezhnev era

· After Khrushchev’s, three men Kosygin, Brezhnev and Podgorny seemed to be sharing power.
· First, Kosygin was the leading figure and the chief spokesman of foreign affairs, while Brezhnev and Podogorny looked after home affairs
· Kosygin pressed for more decentralization over economic policies, but this was very unpopular with other leaders that said that this would give too much independence of thought in the satellite states
· Brezhnev became leader (just he) in 77 until his death in 82. .
· Broadly speaking his policy was similar to Khrushchev’s.

1. Economic policies

· Economic policies maintained wage differentials and profit incentives (handlings stimulering) and some growth to take place but the rate was slow.
· The system remained strongly centralized and Brezhnev reluctant to change anything
· The production of harvest in 81 was a disaster. By this time much of Russian industry was old fashioned and in need of new production and processing technology. The building industry was also extremely low
· Because of this, USSR was depended on American wheat. In 1980 an American agricultural worker produced enough to feed 70 people, while in Russia only enough for ten people.





2. The Eastern Block

The Eastern Block was expected to obey Moscow’s rule
When liberal threads developed in Czechoslovakia, the Russian and the Warsaw Pact troops attacked the country and removed the Dubcek government with a pro-Moscow regime
The Brezhnev Doctrine was built. This would involve the intervention in internal affairs in any communist country that was under threat. The invasion in Afghanistan was the most blatant application of the doctrine
Romania refused to be part of the invasion of Czechoslovakia because they wanted to maintain good relations with China


3. Human rights

Brezhnev’s record on human right was not impressive, though he claimed to be in favor of the Helsinki agreement and he appeared to make improvements, but in fact little progress was made
Groups were set up to check if the terms of the agreement were kept, but they were met with exiles, imprisonments, arrests and deportations by the authorities. These groups were even dissolved (82’)

4. Foreign Policies

The Russians worked against détente, but after 79’ relations with the West deteriorated, this because of the invasion in Afghanistan
Short after that he increased the aid in Cuba, offered aid to Angola, Mozambique and Ethiopia and increased the armed forces, in particularly the navy and the new SS-20 missiles.


b) Andropov and Chernenko


After Brezhnev’s death Russia was ruled shortly by two elderly and ailing politicians (Andropov, Nov 82’-Feb 84’) and (Chernenko Feb 84- March 85’)

Andropov head of KGB until May 82, he:
He introduced a campaign of making Russia more efficient and to modernize it.

He began an anti corruption drive and introduced a program of economic reform, hoping to increase production by encouraging

He replaced old party officials with young men.


· Died because of illness



· Chernenko was 72 years old and has not succeeded with the human rights. He held Sakharov in exile.
· Members of an unofficial trade union, supporters of a group for the establishment of trust between the USA and the USSR, and members of an unofficial religious groups were all arrested


16.7 Gorbachev and the end of communist rule


· Came to power at the age of 54, was the most dynamic leader Russia had seen for many years.
· He was determined to transform and revitalize the country after all the policies.
· He intended to achieve this by modernizing and streamlining the communist party with the new policies of glasnost (openness) and perestroika (restructuring- economic and social reform) REFORM= FÖRBÄTTRING TILL DET BÄTTRE

This made an impact on foreign affairs on détente, relations with China, a withdrawal from Afghanistan and ultimately the ending of the Cold War.


· Gorbachev outlined what was wrong in a speech in 88’. The system was to centralized, leaving no room for local individual initiative. It was based on state ownership and control and weighted strongly towards defense and heavy industry, leaving consumer goods for ordinary people in short supply.

· He did not want to end communism, he wanted to replace the Stalinist system, with a socialist system that was humane and democratic. He had more success abroad the at home.

· His policies failed to provide results quickly enough, and led to the collapse of communism, the breakup of the USSR and the end of his own political career.

a) Gorbachev’s new policies

1. Glasnost

This was soon seen in areas such as human rights and cultural affairs. Several well known dissidents were released and the Shakarovs were allowed to return to Moscow from Gorky.
Leaders like Bukharin were declared innocent of against all the crimes. Pravda (in west known as the communist voice; it was the newspaper of the Central Committee of party) was allowed to publish criticisms against Brezhnev’s unfair attitude towards the dissidents.
Important political events were televised.
______________________

· In cultural matters, the film makers were allowed to make films against Stalin and all the earlier anti Stalin materiel was released
· There was a new freedom of news reporting, this because:

Use the media to publicize the inefficiency and corruption which the government was so anxious to stamp about
Educate public opinion
Mobilize support for the new policies

· Nobody was allowed to criticize the party itself

2. Economic affairs

· Gorbachev announced that 1987 would be the year for broad applications of the new methods of economic management
· Co Operatives to a maximum of 50 workers would be allowed (family restaurants, making clothes, TV or car repairs). This policy was created because:

1. To provide competition for the slow and inefficient services of the state, in the hope of stimulating a rapid economy

2. The need to provide alternative employment changed over the following decade: as more automation and computerization are introduced in factories and in offices, the need for manual work decreases.

3. The responsibility for quality control throughout industry as a whole was to be taken over by independent state bodies rather than factory management


The most important part of the reforms was the Law on Ste Enterprises (June 87) that removed the central planners’ total control over raw materials, production quotas and trade and made factories work to orders from customers.


3. Political changes

This began in January 87 when Gorbachev announced that he moves towards democracy within the party.
Instead of members of local soviets being appointed by the local communist party, they were to be elected by the people and there was to be a choice of candidates (not of parties) ; There were to be secret elections for top party positions and elections in factories to choose managers.
During 1988 dramatic changes in central government were achieved.
In May 89 the first Congress of People’s Deputies met. During the second session (December 89), it was decided that the reserved seats for the communist party should be abolished. Gorbachev was elected President of the Soviet Union (March 90), with 2 councils to advise him. 1 was his adviser, the other 1 contained representatives from the 15 satellite states
This system sidelined the old system, the communist party was on the verge to lose its privileged position


b) What went wrong with Gorbachev’s policies?

1. Opposition from radicals and conservatives

· As the reforms got underway, Gorbachev ran into problems

· Party leaders as Boris Yeltsin were more radical that Gorbachev and thought that the reforms were not drastic enough. They wanted to change to a western style market economy as soon as possible, though they knew that this would give short termed difficulties to the Russians

· The conservatives (the large majority), on the other hand, felt that the changes were too drastic

· Glasnost that encouraged the people to voice their criticism was now in full flow, and was beginning to turn against the communist party.

· This and other factors caused a dangerous split in the party and made it difficult for Gorbachev to satisfy either group.


2. The economic reforms did not produce results quickly enough

· In 90’ the national income actually fell and continued to fall, by about 15% by 91. Some economics think that USSR was going through an economic crisis as serious as the one in the US in the mid 30’s.

· The problem was that wages were now dependent on output, but since output was measured in roubles, factories were tempted not to increase overall output, but to concentrate on more expensive goods and reduce output of cheaper goods. This lead to higher wages, forcing the factories to produce more money causing inflation

· This led to major protests. The miners in USSR’s largest coalmining areas started a strike (1/2 million were on strike). They organized miners put forward 42 demands; better living and working conditions, better supplies for food, a share in the profits, more local control over the mines and later on, influenced by Poland, demanded own trade unions. The government granted many of the demands as full control over the mines. But still, by the end of 89, a quarter of the population leaved below the poverty line.

· Gorbachev was losing control and the miners encouraged even more radicals









3. Nationalist pressures


The nationalism, the glasnost and the perestroika encouraged the 14 satellite states to hope for more and more power from Moscow.

a) A fight occurred between Azerbajdjan and Armenia over an area called Nagorno, Gorbachev could do nothing about this since the conservative view. This created the loss of power of Moscow
b) The Baltic States, influenced by the rest of Eastern Europe, simply declared itself independent (Lithuania), and the other two soon followed. Moscow refused to recognize their independence
c) Yelstin that was excluded from the new supreme soviet by the conservatives, made a dramatic comeback and was elected president of the Russian republic in may 1990

4. Gorbachev and Yelstin were now bitter rivals and they disagreed on many fundamental issues

a) Yeltsin thought that the satellites should have the right to decide of they want to be part of the USSR or not and they would still have, if they are a part, some responsibilities to USSR. Gorbachev disagreed saying that this would cause disintegration
b) Yeltsin was disillusioned with the communist party and with the conservatives and how they treated him. He thought that the party no longer had the privilege to exist, while Gorbachev was still a convinced communist that thought that a humane democratic communism would be great.
c) Yeltsin thought also that the answer was a rapid changeover to market economy and he knew that this would be painful for the Russians. Gorbachev was still cautious, realizing that a possible market economy would cause a disaster in the country. He was aware of how unpopular he was.




c) The Coup of August 91


As the crisis began Yeltsin and Gorbatchev tried to work together, and Gorbatchev felt himself being pushed towards free multy party elections.
As several Eastern European states wanted independence, in a speech Gorbachev announced that the remained satellite states had the right to be independent of Moscow. This agreement would be signed the 20th August 91’. The conservatives now were angry and organized a coup; during his vacation Gorbachev was arrested and held under household. Meantime, Yeltsin reigned from the communist party and now the communists surrounded Moscow with tanks. Yelstin succeeded to announce the coup in public, and now as a hero, he was the leader of Federation of Russia. And the coup leaders got arrested (21 Aug).
This meant that:

The communist party was disgraced and discredited. The party was banned in the Russian Federation. Gorbachev resigned as party secretary.

Yeltsin was considered the hero, while Gorbachev was sidelined. Yeltsin ruled the Russian federation, introducing programs for free market economy. The Ukraine gained independence and the USSR was over.

Yelstin negotiated for a new union of republics. The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) was joined by Belorussia and the Russian Federation, the Ukraine + 8 other republics (8 Dec 81’). They were fully independent but they would work together on economic matters and defense.

These developments meant that Gorbachev’s role as president still existed, so on the Christmas Day 91, he resigned



d) Verdict on Gorbachev


· Despite his failures, he was one of the most outstanding leader
· His achievements in foreign affairs were enormous. His policies of glasnost and perestroika restored freedom to the people. His policies of reducing militarily expenditure, détente and withdrawal from Afghanistan and Eastern Europe
· People say that he is the real successor of Lenin
· The communism survived in China but not on the USSR because the Chinese introduced economic reforms first and leaving the power of the communist power unchanged. This meant that even if people suffered economic hardship, the government retained tight control over them, and in the last resort was prepared to use violence against them. In USSR Gorbachev believed that all the reforms could be obtained simultaneously (government and economic). He first tried to achieve political reform and then economic reform without any really economic fundamental innovations
· 1991 did not bring about the death of communism, but it killed the Stalinism. In several countries reformed communist parties re merged, sometimes under different names.

e) Russia after Gorbachev


· Yelstin was faced by the same problem as Gorbatchev, to transform Russia into a market economy by privatizing the inefficient, support financially state industries and agriculture.
· Yelstin was very popular but he had to keep his promises about the living standards. During 92 and 93 the economy was still in decline and the people lived worse than under glasnost and perestroika.
· Russia started a new conflict with the Chechens who wanted to regain independence.
· During the first half of 1996 the economy started to show signs of recover, inflation decreased and production increased
· Elections were due in June 96’. And the members of the Commonwealth were afraid, also because Yeltsin’s competition with Zyuganov, that a former communist leader would gain the power again. In the election they and the International Monetary Fund backed Yeltsin (a loan of 10 million dollars)
· He received even more support when he succeeded to negotiate cease fire with Chechenia and doing so won with 3% against Zyuganov. The people were afraid, because of Yeltsin’s health, that he would not complete his mandate.