Disintegration of the USSR. The Greatest Geopolitical Crisis of the Twentieth Century

The disintegration of the USSR, the largest in terms of area of the state, occupying 1/6 of the land inhabited is undoubtedly the largest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century, which was a systemic disintegration in the economic, social, political and social structures of the Soviet Union.

At the present time, historians do not have the same opinion as on what was the main cause of the collapse of the USSR, and whether it was possible to prevent the process of disintegration. However, the factors leading to the collapse were sufficient, including the authoritarian nature of Soviet society, the disproportion of the extensive economy, a number of major man-made disasters, interethnic conflicts including the 1972 riots in Kaunas, mass demonstrations in 1978 in Georgia, the events of 1980 In Minsk, the December events of 1986 in Kazakhstan, etc.: all this resulted in the concatenation leading to the disintegration of the Soviet system.

Attempts to reform the Soviet system led to a deepening crisis in the country, which in the political arena was expressed as a confrontation between the President of the USSR Gorbachev and the President of the RSFSR Yeltsin.

The countries of the Soviet commonwealth began to defend their independence. The requirement of autonomy for each of the 15 Soviet republics threatened a system of central political control. Despite this, in August 1991, Gorbachev announced that on August 20 the Soviet government would sign a new treaty called "Union of Sovereign States" with 15 republics, which would delegate to them a significant part of the powers of the central government. Naturally, the supporters of the system, the center of which was the Communist Party, could not accept this, because each state received the right to independently resolve its already internal problems, which meant a loss of power for the Soviet government. In addition, there were other problems related to the inadmissibility of the treaty, such as the problem of the division of strategic missile forces, air defense and, of course, the armed forces between the republics equally.

All this combined resulted in the politically and logically predicted August's putsch, and the creation of the Extraordinary Committee without Gorbachev, who declared a state of emergency in the morning of August 19, and also informed that the presidential powers were transferred to Vice President Gennady Yanayev.

Boris Yeltsin criticized the actions of Gorbachev and the Central Committee, both in the government house and on the streets of the city. Cleverly manipulated the consciousness of the people, and managed to send a large part of the population to his support. After the declaration of the state of emergency, posts were restored in Moscow, and about 500 tanks and armored vehicles of the Emergency Committee were mobilized. But the absence of explicit military support did not stop Boris Nikolayevich, and he continued to speak to the crowd even while standing on one of these tanks. Having achieved the complete removal of Gorbachev, and leaving the Soviet government without a leader, he issued a presidential decree, according to which the whole army passed to him, and finally stopped attempts by the right forces to prevent the signing of the treaty. Thus, the collapse of the Soviet Union led to the independence of 15 republics and their appearance on the world political arena as independent states.

On August 22, Yeltsin, together with two hundred thousand people in the square, celebrated the victory, openly condemned the Communist Party, which ruled the country for 70 years, and approved a tricolor flag, thereby confirming the separation of Russia from the USSR.

On August 24, 1991, Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary and dissolved the party.