USSR

By mmmica
  • 1987 BCE

    Demokratizatsiya 2

    The slogan of Demokratizatsiya was part of Gorbachev's set of reform programs, including glasnost, officially announced in mid-1986, and uskoreniye, which failed miserably. Perestroika, another slogan that became a full-scale campaign in 1987, embraced them all.Gorbachev had concluded that implementing his reforms outlined at the Twenty-Seventh Party Congress. He changed his strategy from trying to work through the CPSU as it existed and instead embraced a degree of political liberalisation.
  • 1987 BCE

    Demokratizatsiya 1

    Demokratizatsiya was a slogan introduced by General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev in January 1987 calling for the infusion of "democratic" elements into the Soviet Union's single-party government. Gorbachev's Demokratizatsiya meant the introduction of multi-candidate—though not multiparty—elections for local Communist Party and Soviets. In this way, he hoped to rejuvenate the party with progressive personnel who would carry out his institutional and policy reforms.
  • Period: 1985 BCE to 1991 BCE

    Gorbachev GLASNOST AND PRESTROIKA

    Gorbachev's policies of glasnost ("openness") and perestroika ("restructuring") and his reorientation of Soviet strategic aims contributed to the end of the Cold War. Under this program, the role of the Communist Party in governing the state was removed from the constitution, which inadvertently led to crisis-level political instability with a surge of regional nationalist and anti-communist activism culminating in the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
  • Period: 1985 BCE to 1991 BCE

    Gorbachev

    Gorbachev later expressed regret for his failure to save the USSR, though he has insisted that his policies were not failures but rather were vitally necessary reforms which were sabotaged and exploited by opportunists. He was awarded the Otto Hahn Peace Medal in 1989, the Nobel Peace Prize in 1990 and the Harvey Prize in 1992, as well as honorary doctorates from various universities.
  • Period: 1985 BCE to 1991 BCE

    Gorbachev

    Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev; born 2 March 1931 is a former Soviet statesman. He was the eighth leader of the Soviet Union, having been General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991. He was the country's head of state from 1988 until 1991 (titled as Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet from 1988 to 1989, as Chairman of the Supreme Soviet from 1989 to 1990, and as President of the Soviet Union from 1990 to 1991).
  • 1978 BCE

    Afghanistan PART 2

    Although this aid did not include arms, it provided nonmilitary supplies and cash with which weapons could be purchased. Six months later, the Soviets sent troops into Afghanistan, a move which immediately led Carter's National Security Adviser to advocate “more money as well as arms shipments to the rebels,” both directly and via Pakistan, China, and Islamic countries.
  • 1978 BCE

    Afghanistan PART 1

    From the U.S. perspective, the anti-Soviet war in Afghanistan began in 1978, when a coup d'état brought a communist regime to power in Kabul. Over the next year, armed resistance grew, a trend which triggered approaches to the CIA by Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. Plans began to be drawn up for reversing “the current Soviet trend and presence in Afghanistan,” and in the summer of 1979, Carter approved covert aid to mujahedin guerrillas.
  • 1969 BCE

    Detente

    Détente is the easing of strained relations, especially in political situation. The term originates in the time of the Triple Entente and Entente cordiale in reference to an easing of tensions between England and France, who subsequent to being commingled polities under Norman rule, were warring rivals for the better part of a millennium but pursuant to a policy of détente became enduring allies.
  • 1968 BCE

    Foreign Policy of a Superpower

    A major concern of Khrushchev's successors was to reestablish Soviet primacy in the community of communist states by undermining the influence of China. Although the new leaders originally approached China without hostility, Mao's condemnation of Soviet foreign policy as "revisionist" and his competition for influence in the Third World soon led to a worsening of relations between the two countries.
  • 1968 BCE

    THE BREZHNEV DOCTRINE PART 1

    When the forces of Stalin and the Soviet Union fought Nazi Germany west across the European continent, the Soviets did not liberate the countries, like Poland, which were in the way; they conquered them. After the war, the Soviet Union made sure these nations had states who would largely do what they were told by Russia, and the Soviets created the Warsaw Pact, a military alliance between these nations, to counter NATO.
  • 1968 BCE

    ORIGINS OF THE BREZHNEV DOCTRINE PART 2

    Berlin had a wall across it, other areas had no less subtle instruments of control, and the Cold War set two halves of the world against each other. However, the satellites states began to evolve as the forties, with a new generation taking control, with new ideas and often less interest in the Soviet empire. Slowly, the 'Eastern Bloc' began to go in different directions, and for a brief time it looked like these nations would assert, if not independence, then a different character.
  • 1966 BCE

    The Rise of Brezhnev

    After removing Khrushchev from power, the leaders of the Politburo and Secretariat again established a collective leadership. As was the case following Stalin's death, several individuals, including Aleksey Kosygin, Nikolay Podgornyy, and Leonid Brezhnev, contended for power behind a facade of unity.
  • 1965 BCE

    The Economy under Brezhnev P.1

    the economic system remained dependent on central plans drawn up with no reference to market mechanisms. Reformers,advocated greater freedom for individual enterprises from outside controls. Prime Minister championed Liberman's proposals and succeeded in incorporating them into a general economic reform approved in September 1965.
  • 1965 BCE

    The Economy under Brezhnev P.2

    This reform included scrapping Khrushchev's regional economic councils in favor of resurrecting the central industrial ministries of the Stalin era. Opposition from party conservatives and cautious managers, however, soon stalled the Liberman reforms, forcing the state to abandon them.
  • 1950 BCE

    Konstantin Chernenko

    Soon after Andropov's death, Konstantin Chernenko, his greatest rival, was elected General Secretary. As a teenager, he was a member of the Communist Youth League, a training ground for those aspiring to positions in the Communist Party. A skilled propagandist, Chernenko was eventually appointed to the important Novoselovo District Komsomol committee, where he led the propaganda and agitation department.
  • 1950 BCE

    Konstantin Chernenko

    In 1950, Chernenko become the head of the communist party in Moldova; by 1971 he was a full member of the Politburo. He was a great favorite of Brezhnev and published numerous papers on the principles of communism and social issues facing the Soviet Union. When Chernenko became General Secretary in 1984, he was already in poor health, as evidenced by his appearance and behavior at Andropov's funeral.
  • Period: 1930 BCE to 1982 BCE

    Yury Andropov

    When Brezhnev died in 1982, the Soviet Politburo elected Yury Andropov, a party member and organizer since the 1930s, to the position of General Secretary. Andropov had previously served as ambassador to Hungary, where he helped to put down the democratic Hungarian Revolution in 1956, as well as the head of the KGB. Adept at personal politics, he moved in the Soviet Union's highest circles and was appointed to the Politburo, the policy-making arm of the Communist Party, in 1973.
  • Period: to

    Nikita Khrushchev

    He was a politician who led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964. Khrushchev was responsible for the de-Stalinization of the Soviet Union, for backing the progress of the early Soviet space program, and for several relatively liberal reforms in areas of domestic policy.
  • Period: to

    Leonid Brezhnev

    He was the General Secretary of the Central Committeeof the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, presiding over the country from 1964 until his death in 1982. During Brezhnev's rule, the global influence of the Soviet Union grew dramatically, in part because of the expansion of the Soviet military during this time. His tenure as leader was marked by the beginning of an era of economic and social stagnation in the Soviet Union.

  • Chernobyl Accident

    The 1986 accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, then part of the former Soviet Union, is the only accident in the history of commercial nuclear power to cause fatalities from radiation. It was the product of a severely flawed Soviet-era reactor design combined with human error. Key differences in U.S. reactor design, regulation and emergency preparedness make it highly unlikely that a Chernobyl-type accident could occur in the United States.