It is my understanding that the CCCP started to fall apart when Lithuania declared independence and Ukraine declared it was going to run Ukraine from Kiev.
The breakup was from the bottom up.
Chernobyl undermined Soviet elites opinion of themselves as the vanguard of an infallible system.
When Russia missed that 1984 window, and then 1985 passed with still no attack, we knew that Reagan’s military build-up while overtaxing the Russian military and their economy, along with his diplomatic victories, alliances, and those mid-range missiles in Europe, Grenada, his ignoring the massive demonstrations in Europe, his activities in Afghanistan, and Africa, we knew we had a long period of no attack coming for at least a decade, we didn’t know the wall would come down in 1991.
And the Devil have him.
Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) was the beginning of the end for the Soviet Union. Whether real or imagined, Reagan’s vision for a strategic shield to protect the United States from nuclear attack was enough to convince Gorbachev he could not compete neither technologically nor financially buidling such a system. It was a brilliant move by Reagan, and ultimately ended the Cold War, even though the very idea was derided by the intelligentsia.
What a time in history that was.
I met him and his daughter once in 2005. Of all places, Manhattan ……………..
………….Kansas.
One final Gorbasm for the NYT.