Oct 23 2024 56 mins
As we begin our four part look back at the fall of the Soviet Union, we begin by looking back at the man who presided over it, Mikhail Gorbachev.
He was reformer, a charismatic leader, and a committed Communist. It is that latter part of the description that is the key to understanding his own downfall. He stayed married to the Communist philosophy to long and due to it was maneuvered out of his job, by another leader, Boris Yeltsin, whose rise was only made possible by the reforms that Gorbachev himself had unleashed.
In this episode we examine both the life, rise and career of Mikhail Gorbachev but also the situation the Soviet Union faced after the committed Communists tried to overthrow Gorbachev in August of 1991. The Gang of 8 were trying to take back control of the country before the Soviet Union fell apart. Instead, they may very well have pushed it over the cliff. It created a change in the power dynamic that even after Gorbachev was restored to the title of President of the USSR, he found himself sharing power with Boris Yeltsin, and all the real power had shifted away from him.
Here is the beginning of that story.
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