Soviet union

Collapse of the Soviet Union

By keyshawn.wdenton

  • Leonid Brezhnev

    Leonid Brezhnev
    Leonid Brezhnev wa the General Secretary of the Committee(CC) of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), presinding over the country from 1964 till his death in 1982.

  • Mikhail Gorbachev

    By the 1985 rise to power of Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet Union’s last leader, the country was in a situation of severe stagnation, with deep economic and political problems which sorely needed to be addressed and overcome. Recognizing this, Gorbachev introduced a two-tiered policy of reform. On one level, he initiated a policy of glasnost, or freedom of speech. On the other level, he began a program of economic reform known as perestroika, or rebuilding

  • Baltic States- the Chain of freedom

    The Baltic Way or Baltic Chain (also Chain of Freedom Estonian: Balti kett, Latvian: Baltijas , Lithuanian: Baltijos kelias, Russian was a peaceful political demonstration that occurred on August 23, 1989. Approximately 2 million people joined their hands to form a human chain spanning over 600 kilometres across the 3 Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, illegally incorporated as republics into the Soviet Union.

  • Algirdas Brazauskas

    On December 7, 1989 the Communist Party of Lithuania under the leadership of Algirdas Brazauskas split from the Communist Party of the Soviet Unio and ended its claim to have a constitutional "leading role"

  • Mykolas Burokevičius

    A smaller loyalist faction of the Communist Party headed by Mykolas Burokevičius was established and remained affiliated to the CPSU. However the governing Communist Party of a Soviet Republic was now formally independent of Moscow's control for the first time.

  • Prime Minister Valentin Pavlov

    On the morning of 15 August, Prime Minister Valentin Pavlov received a revised text of Gorbachev's new Union treaty. This was to be a landmark agreement, involving the devolution of power, which would redefine the relationship with all the Soviet republics for the future

  • Gorbachev

    Gorbachev
    August 19, 1991, these hard-liners - calling themselves the "State Emergency Committee" - launched the August Coup in an attempt to remove Gorbachev from power and prevent the signing of the treaty. This lasted until August 22, when it collapsed.

  • Final fall of the Soviet Union

    Final fall of the Soviet Union
    Belavezha Accords on December 8, 1991, declaring the end of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev resigned as the president of the USSR on December 25, and the Soviet Union officially dissolved the following day.