RIP Mikhail Gorbachev

The 90s were pretty sucky for Russia and large parts of the ex-USSR -- but compared to the disintegration of other states (ex: Yugoslavia), Gorbachev managed a pretty smooth landing.
 
europe1 said:
The 90s were pretty sucky for Russia and large parts of the ex-USSR -- but compared to the disintegration of other states (ex: Yugoslavia), Gorbachev managed a pretty smooth landing.
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Anyone remember the car Yugo?
 
TheMaster said:
A good man.

He agreed to the reunification of East and West Germany on the condition that NATO would not move "one inch to the East'.

Of course NATO double-crossed him later and we are seeing the consequences today.
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Yeah let's take his word for it. <Lmaoo>
 
Prefect said:
This isn't really the case at all. Reagan didn't bring down the Soviet Union. Gorbachev did and without bloodshed or himself getting killed by the hardliners. History will always be written that Reagan won but it was Gorbchev that was doing Game of Thrones level politicking to change everything. The revolution wouldn't have happened had a man who maybe comes along once every 100 years managed to rise to power in Russia. Calling the man remarkable is an understatement.
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Lol that isnt what happened either dude. Gorby was a committed communist and Soviet who tried everything in his power to preserve as much of the Soviet Union as he could until the hardliners couped him and he lost all control of the process. There was the 1991 Soviet Union Referendum and the New Union Treaty that was Gorbachev's actual political goal not dissolution. Once Gorby got discredited by his own people the nationialists in the individual republics gained control of the narrative and it shifted from ratifying the new union treaty to full independence for the individual republics. Before that Gorbachev was going to reform the Soviet Union minus the Baltics into the "Union of Sovereign States" with a more democratic tilt but still firmly socialist and not a pro-western free-market liberal-democracy lol.

I guess he was remarkably lucky in how he managed to avoid a civil war when the coup against him flopped and discredited the hardliners along with himself, but it wasnt due to any sort of genius political machinations by him.

You make it sound like relatively peaceful dissolution was some sort of master scheme he was planning all along behind the scenes and not a happy accident that occured on his shift.
 
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Growing up in the 80's, I would have never imagined this:
231.jpg
 
Get To Da Choppa said:
He was distraught over his legacy being ruined with pizza hut and McDonald's leaving Russia

He had good intentions, but his reforms didn't work out because how rotted the Soviet system was. I wonder if someone else came in power after Chernenko how different Russia, and the world would look
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There were always the old hard liners waiting in the background to make the Soviet Union great again.
 
Oedad said:
Lol that isnt what happened either dude. Gorby was a committed communist and Soviet who tried everything in his power to preserve as much of the Soviet Union as he could until the hardliners couped him and he lost all control of the process. There was the 1991 Soviet Union Referendum and the New Union Treaty that was Gorbachev's actual political goal not dissolution. Once Gorby got discredited by his own people the nationialists in the individual republics gained control of the narrative and it shifted from ratifying the new union treaty to full independence for the individual republics. Before that Gorbachev was going to reform the Soviet Union minus the Baltics into the "Union of Sovereign States" with a more democratic tilt but still firmly socialist and not a pro-western free-market liberal-democracy lol.

I guess he was remarkably lucky in how he managed to avoid a civil war when the coup against him flopped and discredited the hardliners along with himself, but it wasnt due to any sort of genius political machinations by him.

You make it sound like relatively peaceful dissolution was some sort of master scheme he was planning all along behind the scenes and not a happy accident that occured on his shift.
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No. That isn't how it went. Perestroika happened under Gorby. Same with small scale private farming. Same with media freedoms. Same with the fact that he didn't he didn't puts boots on the ground to strong arm countries that were splitting off from the union. Gorby may not wanted a dissolution of the union but he was a huge cry from previous leadership or even current leadership. Gorb was hard tilt towards friendliness towards the west and an adoption of democracy. You keep bringing up socialism as if that was some hinging point. Norway and Sweden are strongly socialist and democratic countries and modern and without conflict with the rest of the west. No one gives a shit if their neighbor is a socialist. The whole hinge was that he pushed the Soviet Union westward and toward democracy, which generally means a more integrated economy and with less aggression.
 
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We, and the world, we’re very lucky that he was in power when and where he was. Such a shame that so much of what he worked for has been undone. RIP Mr. Gorbachev, you did what you could.
 
RIP dude I only knew from Street Fighter 2
 
I guess it's impolite to say bad things about the dead.

Thanks for accidentally destroying the Soviet Union, I guess, that was nice. :)

RIP.
 
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