-
U.S. boycott of 1980 Summer Olympics
The 1980 Summer Olympics boycott of the Moscow Olympics was a part of a package of actions initiated by the United States to protest against the Soviet invasion in Afghanistan. It preceded the 1984 Summer Olympics boycott carried out by the Soviet Union and other Communist-friendly countries. -
“Caribbean Basin Initiative”
The Caribbean Basin Initiative (CBI) was a unilateral and temporary United States program initiated by the 1983 "Caribbean Basin Economic Recovery Act" (CBERA). The CBI came into effect on January 1, 1984 and aimed to provide several tariff and trade benefits to many Central American and Caribbean countries. It arose in the context of a U.S. desire to respond with aid and trade to leftist movements that were active in some countries of the region. -
Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) (“Star Wars”)
The Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) was proposed by U.S. President Ronald Reagan on March 23, 1983, to use ground-based and space-based systems to protect the United States from attack by strategic nuclear ballistic missiles. The initiative focused on strategic defense rather than the prior strategic offense doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD). The Strategic Defense Initiative Organization (SDIO) was set up in 1984 within the United States Department of Defense to oversee. -
Mikhail Gorbachev becomes General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (born 2 March 1931) is a former Soviet statesman. He was the seventh and last undisputed leader of the Soviet Union, having served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 until 1991, and as the country's head of state from 1988 until its dissolution in 1991 (titled as Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet from 1988 to 1990 and President of the Soviet Union from 1990 to 1991). -
Iran-Contra Affair
The Iran–Contra affair also referred to as Irangate,[1] Contragate or the Iran–Contra scandal, was a political scandal in the United States that came to light in November 1986. During the Reagan administration, senior administration officials secretly facilitated the sale of arms to Iran, the subject of an arms embargo. Some U.S. officials also hoped that the arms sales would secure the release of several hostages and allow U.S. intelligence agencies to fund the Nicaraguan Contras. -
Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) ratified
The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) is a 1987 agreement between the United States and the Soviet Union. Signed in Washington, D.C. by U.S. President Ronald Reagan and General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev on December 8, 1987, it was ratified by the United States Senate on May 27, 1988 and came into force on June 1 of that year. The treaty eliminated nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with intermediate ranges, between 500-5,500 km (300-3,400 miles) -
Berlin Wall collapses
The date on which the Wall fell is considered to have been 9 November 1989, but the Wall in its entirety was not torn down immediately. Starting that evening and in the days and weeks that followed, people came to the wall with sledgehammers or otherwise hammers and chisels to chip off souvenirs, demolishing lengthy parts of it in the process and creating several unofficial border crossings. These people were nicknamed "Mauerspechte" (wall woodpeckers). -
Germany is reunified
The German reunification (German: Deutsche Wiedervereinigung) was the process in 1990 in which the German Democratic Republic (GDR/East Germany) joined the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG/West Germany) to form the reunited nation of Germany, and when Berlin reunited into a single city, as provided by its then Grundgesetz constitution Article 23. The end of the unification process is officially referred to as German unity (German: Deutsche Einheit), celebrated on 3 October (German Unity Day). -
1st McDonalds opens in Moscow
On January 31, 1990 the first Soviet McDonald's opens, in Moscow. At the time it is the largest McDonald's in the world. Although this has been described as being opened by McDonald's Canada "for political reasons" this was completely untrue. All of the McDonalds restaurants in all of the former Soviet Union are wholly owned by McDonalds Canada with no input from the U.S. parent company; a wall display within the restaurant shows the Canadian and Soviet flags. -
Warsaw Pact is dissolved
The Warsaw Pact (formally, the Treaty of Friendship, Co-operation, and Mutual Assistance) was a collective defense treaty among eight communist States of Central and Eastern Europe in existence during the Cold War. The founding treaty was established under the initiative of the Soviet Union and signed on 14 May 1955, in Warsaw. Disestablished the 1 July 1991. -
Boris Yelstin elected President of Russia
Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin (1 February 1931 – 23 April 2007) was a Russian politician and the first President of the Russian Federation, serving from 1991 to 1999. -
End of the Soviet Union
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) formally ceased to exist on 26 December 1991. The increasing political unrest led the establishment of the Soviet military and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union to attempt a coup d'état to oust Mikhail Gorbachev and re-establish a strong central regime in August 1991. On December 26, 1991, the dissolution of the Soviet Union was finalized by declaration no. 142-H of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union.
