Disintegration Of Soviet Union

Answer : The most important consequences of the Second World War were the emergence of two super powers – the United States of America and the Soviet Union. They emerged as the most powerful nations in the world. The USA had suffered relatively little from the war and had enjoyed great prosperity from supplying the other allies with the war materials and food. The Soviet Union though severally weakened still had largest army the main base which lent the auto of strength to Soviet Union was the economic and political prowess of her communist system.

However by the 1980s the Communist system of the Soviet Union was incapable of maintaining the country’s role as a superpower. First Stalin tried to build the economic strength of Russia by making determined effort to overcome the problems. Immense problems faced communist Russia which was still a few years old. Industry and Agriculture were backward and inefficient, there was constant food shortages, pressing social and political problems. There was also the danger of another attempt by foreign capitalist powers to destroy the new communist state. Stalin though had no economic experience whatsoever, had no hesitation in plunging the country into a series of dramatic changes designed to overcome these problems in shortest possible time. Industrial expansion was tackled by series of five year plans, the first two of which were said to have been completed a year ahead of schedule.

The first plan concentrated on heavy industry- coal, iron, oil and machinery which were scheduled to triple output. The two later plans provided for some increases in consumer goods as well as in heavy industry. Despite all kinds of mistaken and exaggerated figures, the plans were a remarkable success. Hundreds of factories were built, many of them in new towns east of the Urals. The cash was provided almost entirely by Russians themselves. Some came from grain exports, some from charging peasants heavily for use of government equipment, and the ruthless plunging back of all profits and surpluses. Hundreds of foreign technicians who brought in and great emphasis was placed on expanding education in colleges and universities and even in factory schools to provide a whole new generation of skilled workers. Medical were given to workers who enlivened record output. Ordinary workers were ruthlessly disciplined, there were severe punishments for had workmanship.

The collectivization dealt with the problem of agriculture. The idea was that the small farms and holdings belonging to the peasants should be merged together to form large collective farms (Kolkhor) jointly owned by peasants. There was no problem in collectivizing landless labourers, but all peasants who owned any property whether they were benefited or not were hostile to the plan, and had to be forced to join by armies of party members. In one sense, Stalin could claim that collectivization was a success it allowed greater mechanization, which did achieve a substantial increase in production in 1937. On the other hand, so many animals had to slaughter that it was 1953 before livestock production recovered.

With the death of Stalin, the situation was similar to that after Latin’s death with no obvious candidate to take over reins. Gradually, Nikita Khrushchev emerged as the leader. He had to encounter severe problems of low standard of living among industrial and agricultural workers and the inefficiency of agriculture, which was still a long way from providing all of Russia’s needs.

Khrushchev was fully aware of the problems and was keen to bring important changes. Industry continued to be organized under the five year plans but the industries now got to concentrate more on light industries producing while goods. A Regional Economic Council was set up to take decisions about and organizing local industries.

Managers were not just to meet quotas and wages depended on output. A vast housing programme was started in 1958. Between 1955 and 1958 the number of ratio per thousand of the population increased from 66 to 171, TV sets from 4 to 82, refrigerators from 4 to 40 and washing machines from 1 to 77. However, this was way behind the USA.

In agriculture, there was a desire to increase food production. Khrushchev’s special brain child was the virgin lamb scheme, 1954 which involved cultivating huge areas of land in Siberia and Kazakhstan. Government increased the payments for crops from the collectives thus providing incentives to produce more. In 1958 the total farm output had risen by 56 percent, grain production more from 82 million tons to 147 million tons.

But then things began to go wrong; the 1963 grain output was down to 110 million tons mainly because of the failure of the virgins load scheme.

The failure of agriculture policy and the ill-health with loss of prestige over urban missile crisis led to Khrushchev’s fall. Ultimately, Brezhnev came to power after Kosygin. His policies were similar to Khrushchev. Economic policies maintained wage differentiate and incentives and some growth took place. But the rate of growth was slow.

The system remained strongly centralized, and Brezhnev was reluctant to take any major initiatives. By 1982, therefore much of the Russian industry was old fashioned and in the need of new production and processing technology.

There was concern about the failure of the coal and oil industries to increase output, and the building greatly. Low production and agricultural yield was still a major problem not once in the period 1980-1984 did the grain production come anywhere near the targets set.

The 1981 harvest was disastrous and 1982 was only slightly better, throwing Russia into an uncomfortable dependency on American wheat. It was calculated that in the USA in 1980 one agricultural worker produced enough to feed 75 people, but his counterpart in Russia and other republic could manage only to feed ten. In May 1982, Andropov immediately launched a vigorous campaign to streamline the system.

He introduced a programme of economic reform hoping to increase production. But by then the systems had stagnated and had lost much of it vigor.

When Gorbachev came, he tried to reform the system by his policies of glasswort and perestroika, only to see the whole system collapsing like a park of cannels before his eyes.

Answer : A significant result of the World War II was the division of the world into two power blocs – one led by the US and the other led by the Soviet Union. These two blocs soon got engaged in a long period of war known as the cold war.

The war raged with varying intensity for almost four decades after the end of the World War II. Though little actual fighting took place directly between the two opposing camps, they attacked each other with propaganda and economic measures and with a general policy of non-cooperation. The period 1947 to 1962 was the most crucial and singing phase of the cold war. With its various dimensions and phases, the world used to be from one moment to another on the brink of another World War.

Though feelings of animosity between the both blocs had its genesis since the Russian Revolution of 1917, it was only post World War II that the hitherto covert war came out first in the open. The Soviet effort to topple the Greek monarchy and established communist regime there provided the first concrete manifestation of the cold war.

The capitalist group under the USA made it their policy to lend support to free people everywhere who are resisting subjugation by armed minorities backed by outside pressures. As a result, the US reined in massive arms and material supplies and the communist forces were defeated in 1949. As a natural corollary to this, the US President Truman came out with his policy of containment of communism known as the Truman Doctrine, which committed the US to contain commission not just in Europe, but throughout the world.

This was followed by the Marshall plan, which offered economic help to countries so that they do not fall under communist trap. It was economic part of the Truman doctrine. The Plan formally known as the European Recovery Programme aimed to promote economic recovery of Europe and to contain communism, as communism was less likely to gain in prosperous Western Europe.

In response to the Truman doctrine and the Marshall Plan, the Soviet Union came out with Cominform. It aimed at drawing together various European communist parties and introducing programme of industrialization collectivization and centralization of Eastern Europe. In 1949, Molotov Plan came which offered Russian aid to the satellite states of URRS. In order to coordinate the economic policies of these countries COMECON – “Communist of Mutual Economic Assistance” was set up by USSR. The succeeding years witnessed lightening of tensions between the power blocs. As a first move, the communists with the support armed coup in 1948. The inclusion of Czechoslovakia, the only remaining democratic state in Eastern Europe completed the descent of the Iron curtain which divided the western capitalist Europe from Eastern Europe. The next important aspect of the cold war during this phase was the Berlin blockade by Russia from June 1948 to May 1949.

Soviet Union was irritated by the West’s attempt to introduce a new economy and ending of price control in their sphere. Embarrassed by the contrast between the prosperity of West Berlin and the pecuniary of areas under its control, Soviet Union decided to cut off all links – rail, road and canal – between West Berlin and West Germany. The western powers not to be bogged down responded with massive emit of supplies to Berlin forcing Soviet Union to end the blockade.

The Berlin blockade had exposed the west’s military unpreparedness and it led them to a military alliance called Brussels Treaty in 1948. The original five European nations were joined by others including the USA in 1949 to make it North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

The members of NATO agreed to regard an attack on any one of them as attack on all, and placed their defences under a joint NATO command. Thus, the cold war realities ended the US policy of Isolation, which was an important development in this phase.

The other dimensions of the cold war during this period extended the cold war to outside Europe. The triumph of communism in China in 1949 had raised the hackles of the USA.

The cold war spotlight in the meanwhile shifted to Korea in Asia. Here a communist North Korea had been created in 1948 with the support of the Russians. In 1950, the North Korea attacked the South Korea. The USA ordered invasion of North Korea to unite Korea and to hold free elections. This opened another theatre of cold war when an alarmed China mobilized its troops into Korea. Ultimately, peace talks ended the crisis in 1953 by approving the division of two Koreas at the 38^th parallel.

The Korean experience led to the formation of several defensive military allowances under the aegis of the USA. In 1954 was formed South East Asia treaty Organisation (SEATU), and in 1955 was signed the Baghdad Pact to contain communism in Asia. The Soviet Union responded by forming Warsaw Pact in 1955 as a mutual defence agreement.

The cold war entered the phase of thaw in the post-1953 period. Several factors led to thaw. Firstly, both the powers the USA and the Soviet Union had developed hydrogen bomb by them which led to realization of mutually assured destruction.

Further, the death of Stalin led to coursing to fore of the new leaders who were keen to improve relations with the USA. In this relaxed atmosphere, Russia took the measures like abandoning Cominform, giving up military bases in Finland, and ending the quarrel with Yugoslavia.

However, the thaw was not without setbacks. The Berlin issue provided the first spanner with Khruschev announcing that Soviet Union no longer recognized the rights of western powers in Berlin. In 1961, he demanded withdrawal of western troops from Berlin and on its refusal Berlin wall was erected in 1961. Further dimension to cold war added by the Cuban Missile crisis of 1962. Khruschev decided to set up nuclear Missile Launchers in Cuba aimed at the USA. This incident almost brought the world to war, but somehow tensions got diffused by the mediation of the United Nations.

Thus, the cold war in the period between 1947 and 1962 developed different dimensions which were not limited only to Europe, but also got extended to Asia, Africa and America.

Answer : The attempt to reform the Soviet system led to its collaspe. The revolution from above initiated recessionism from below. The search of real socialism led to the demise of barracks socialism and a grouping towards capitalism.

In this regard this is also highly debated subject that whether Soviet disintegration was a breakdown due to long term weakness of the Soviet Union or it was the collapse of the great socialist order by reforms initiated by Gorbachev. A brief analysis of the reforms and the processes which emerged as their consequences, would show that it was conjunction of the objective and objective contradictions—the long term accumulation of weakness and short-term methods of their resolution, which broke the Soviet Union into 15 independent Republics.

Basically after 1980’s onwards the Soviet system was running into problems in meeting the requirements of a modern industrial state with super power status. The communist system in USSR had no doubt a great success in modernising the whole Russia and its different states. Infrastructural development and economic upliftment of the masses were the two important factors which played important role maintaining Russian integrity and unity. First significant the Russian unification and its emergence as USSR was based on the need of economic development of the different regions or states. This itself was a major weakness. No nation can be unified for a long span of time without nationalist spirit of the people and the most vital factor of modern state that is cultural nationalism. Soviet Union lacked cultural nationalism and union itself was nothing a kind of federation based on economic cooperation and single standing army system.

This is also a significant fact that industrial growth of nation depends always on a fare competition in the domestic market. Such kind of competition is also needed for technological upgradation and quality improvement. The USSR had a centralized bureaucratic ordered in which work for an industrial setup was a compulsion and worker, technicians and other had no share in the profit. This is also a well understood fact that love for labour also depends on personal benefit. Maintaining parity in development was also a great problem for USSR. Its Central Asian regions were comparatively less developed than Russian and Ukraine despite being important in terms of natural resources. This is also noticeable fact that many of the Central Asian Republics having oil reserves had always a feeling that resources of their native land was used for other regions of the Union.

USSR as a communist system of governance not only established secular norms and notions but it also banned the religious practices. This is also a well known fact that people cannot live without religion or belief system. Very especially religious feeling in the Central Asiatic region had always been very strong. Even in Russia people were indeed in need of vital change at the sphere of society and religion and no doubt the Soviet system itself was the biggest obstacle in this field.

People in USSR had nostalgia for the art and architecture of the period of medieval period. They had accepted the values established by the communist order, but there were people who were proud of the old glory and had different viewprints on issues related with Russian history and culture.

International economic scenario is equally important in this regard. After WTO’s convention and the process of globalization and privatization facing international challenges became difficult for the communist economy of USSR. With the evolution of new world order and process of democratalization also changes had become inevitable in USSR. In this situation Gorbachev has to introduce reform procedures which he termed as Perestroika, Glasnost and Demokratia. Gorbachev’s reforms were not evolutionary and systematic, they attacked the system from all sides and a number of issues were raised simultaneously.

Reforms introduced by Grobachev brought ethnic problems to the forefront. The demand from the Baltics for independence was the most serious issue. Gorbachev appointed a commission to look into the 1939 Hilter-Stalin pact which brought the Baltics into the Soviet Union. The condemnation of this pact as illegal and invalid by the Congress of people’s Deputies in December 1989 endorsed the demand of secession instead of healing the old wounds. Lithuania declared independence in March 1990, followed by similar demands by Latvia and Estonia.

Further nationalist uprisings in Ukraine and Georgia, and inter-ethnic clashes between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh enclave, indicated that reforms were aggravating ethnic nationalism. The demand for independence was not restricted to the Baltics. Moldova, Georgia, Armenia and Ukraine, voiced this demand.

Gorbachev suggested a three tier system but that was also opposed and so realizing his failure the state committee of emergency ordered his arrest and seized control of the centre which has already distintegrated. The resolution by Slav states on ending the Soviet Union and establishing the Commonwealth of Independent states was the last blow on the dismantling Soviet system and it caused the emergence of new states and the final disintegration of USSR.

Answer : The cold war had begun at a time when the allies, including the US and USSR had successfully defeated the Nazi Germany and her axis partners. The world had expected the lasting friend among the victors when they split and formed two hostile camps. The cold war ended (1990) at a time when the common man had come to live with it and it was expected that (despite ups and downs and detente) the east-west conflict would become permanent. When the cold war suddenly ended, the Western Bloc had not expected ‘victory’ and the Eastern Bloc was still dreaming of self destruction of capitalism. The end of cold war came under the aegis of two rather improbable collaborators—Ronald Reagan and Mikhial Gorbachev. The American president had been elected to reaffirm the traditional varieties of American exceptionalism. He was expected to continue to contain communism, not to defeat it. He represented the right in US society. Gorbachev was determined to reinvigorate what he considered a superior soviet ideology. Reagan and Gorbachev both believed in the ultimate victory of their side. Henry Kissinger compared the two men and concluded that while “Reagan understood the mainsprings of his society, whereas Gorbachev had completely lost touch with his society”.

The process of end of Cold War started in the second half of the 1980s when there was softening in the attitude of the top leaders and they adopted conciliatory posters towards each other. The first concrete manifestation of this change was the Malta Summit between president Bush of US and Mikhail Gorvachev of Soviet Union. In this summit, held aboard ship off Malta on 2 December 1989, the two leaders made a serious bid to reduce tensions and check the growing threats or conflicts in various areas like middle-east. It has rightly been asserted that the Malta Summit marked the beginning of a new phase in the post World War II international polities. It also laid the foundation of political cooperation between US and USSR in shaping the post war order in Europe.

The Washington Summit (May 30-June 2, 1990)further contributed to the easing of cold war. At this summit president Bush and President Gorbachev concluded a number of agreements on nuclear, chemical and conventional arms. The two sides agreed to destroy thousands of tons of chemical weapons and reduce their stockpiles. They agreed to start destruction of these weapons in 1992 and finish it by 2002 AD. They also agreed to cease further production of these weapons with immediate effect. Another important outcome of this summit was that the two leaders agreed on principles regarding the strategic Armed Reduction Treaty (START) which was finally signed on 21 July, 1991. Under this treaty the two superpowers agreed to effect reduction to equal levels in defined strategic offensive arm over a period of seven years. They also agreed to set up a joint commission on certification and inspection. This was followed by announcement of ‘Unilateral disarmament’ by president Bush. He even indicated his intention to take nuclear tactical weapons out of European soil and reduce possibility of any accidental war. President Bush removed from alert status all missile covered by START and ordered removal of all nuclear artillery shells from overseas bases. He urged Soviet Union to match the nuclear arms cut. The soviet leaders responded favorably and on 5 October 1991 president Gorbachev not only announced extensive cuts in tactical nuclear weapon, but also announced cut of more missiles then it was required under START. Further, Soviet Union also announced one year moratorium on nuclear testing.

This process of unilateral cut of nuclear arms was repeated by president Bush in Jan, 1992, and president Yeltsin of Russia responded equally and announced a 10 point disarmament with the objective of liquidating all nuclear, biological and chemical weapons of mass destruction.

In the meanwhile the leaders of North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and the Warsaw Pact held a conference on security and cooperation in Europe (CSCE), in Paris in November 1990 with a view to eliminate the threats of surprise attack and establish parity of conventional weapons in Europe. The treaty provided for scrapping or conversion about 40,000 tanks and equal number of armored vehicle as well as more than 50,000 artillery pieces on both sides. It was also decided to refuse the number of fighting planes and helicopter gunships. In the wake of above developments the leaders of Warsaw Pact countries decided to dissolve the Eastern European alliance in July 1991. This put an end to east-west confrontation.

The factors which contributed to the end of cold war are that first, the changed strategic perception of two super powers greatly contributed to the end of cold war. As the two super powers attained parity in nuclear weapons, they realised that nuclear weapons would be suicidal for both. None of them would be able to win the war, while both would be ruined beyond redemption. Second the enormous expenses being incurred on the maintenance of military bases across the seas, was greatly straining the economy of US and it was though desirable to curb this futile expenditure, particularly in view of the fact that the maintenance of military bases provided only nominal gains.

Third, the two superpowers came to realize that the regional conflicts and proxy wars (as in Vietnam, Angola and Afghanistan) had served no useful purpose. On the other hand these wars had caused serious financial burdens on the two superpowers. This economic strain in turn had led to deterioration of economy of the two countries. This resulted in record trade and budget deficits in United States. Kikewise the military commitment in lands situated far away had upset the soviet economy. All this obliged the leaders of two superpowers to climb down from the earlier rigid postures and reduce military expenditure.

When the cold war ended, it was expected that an ideal world based on understanding, cooperation, disarmament and peace would emerge. But this happened only in the term of America alone.

In the post cold war world there have been and are many crises, but no overriding ideological challenge to the united states. Chinese communist leaders have opted for liberation, though in their own style. China is no more ideological challenge to the United States, her being people’s republic not withstanding. There are emerging economic competitors like Germany and Japan and Russia is still a nuclear power and can pose a challenge to American superiority. Almost every situation in post-cold war period in a special case. Circumstances helped the United States to prevail in the cold war. But, it may not be very easy for her to dominate the (expected) multipolar world of the twenty-first century.

After the breakup of USSR, US became the sole power to interfere in matters of the world politics in her own terms. The possibility of Unipolar world was being discussed. The US tried to build a new world order by applying its own domestic values to the world at large. Russia was too involved in its own domestic problems. The US led 28 nation coalition’s military action against Iraq for the liberation of Kuwait in 1991 played a major role for the US ascendancy in the world. Its role in Afghanistan has also proved her supremacy over the world community unchallenged.