Stephen Kotkin0192802453, 9780192802453
In 1991, the world looked in amazement at the collapse of the Soviet Union. But as Stephen Kotkin asserts in his concise, uncompromising history, this downfall was neither sudden nor unexpected but rather inevitable. Combining historical and geopolitical analysis with an absorbing narrative, Kotkin draws upon extensive research, including memoirs of dozens of insiders and senior figures. He illuminates the factors that led to the demise of Communism and the USSR, putting the collapse in the context of theglobal economic changes from the 1970s to the present day, examining for example why the advent of Siberian oil had profound effects on the Soviet Union’s raison d’etre. Kotkin also provides vivid portraits of key personalities. Using recently released archive materials, for example, he paints a newpicture of Gorbachev’s rise to General Secretary. Further, we see Gorbachev, the virtuoso tactician and resolutely committed reformer, “flabbergasted by the fact that his socialist renewal was leading to the system’s liquidation” – and more or less going along with it. Here, too, is Boris Yeltsin,full of the theatrics and “ham-handed populism” that especially aggravated Gorbachev. Finally, Kotkin creates a compelling profile of the “stable mess” that is post-Soviet Russia and he reminds us, with chilling immediacy, of what could not have been predicted – that the world’s largest police state,with several million troops, a doomsday arsenal, and an appalling record of violence, would liquidate itself with barely a whimper. At once authoritative and provocative, Armageddon Averted illuminates the collapse of the Soviet Union, revealing how “principled restraint and scheming self-interest brought a deadly system to meek dissolution.” |
Table of contents :
EEn……Page 1
Dedication……Page 6
Preface……Page 8
Contents……Page 14
Notes on the text……Page 15
List of plates……Page 16
List of maps……Page 18
Introduction……Page 24
1 – History’s Cruel Tricks……Page 33
2 – Reviving the dream……Page 54
3 – The drama of reform……Page 81
4 – Waiting for the end of the world……Page 109
5 – Survival and cannibalism in the rust belt……Page 136
6 – Democracy without liberalism?……Page 165
7 – Idealism and treason……Page 194
Notes……Page 236
Further Reading……Page 272
Index……Page 276 |
Reviews
There are no reviews yet.