Who ruined the USSR? Was the collapse of the USSR malicious intent? Topic: the collapse of the USSR is an accident or a pattern

REASONS FOR THE COLLAPSE OF THE USSR

Yeltsin's press secretary P. Voshchanov called the reason for the collapse of the USSR as follows:

“Everything is much more complicated. You remember how in 1991 everyone was already talking about the transition to the market. But what is a market? New ownership relations and new owners. The struggle between the center and local political elites at that time was a struggle for who would play first fiddle in the historical division. This is the main thing in the tragedy.”

Everything is correct here, except for the word "tragedy". Gorbachev created a bourgeois SSG from the communist USSR: a multi-party system, the ban on the CPSU, the dispersal of the Politburo, the introduction of a market (literally capitalist) economy, and finally the very replacement of the USSR with Gorbachev's SSG.

As Gorbachev thought, he would be able to manage such a new bourgeois country. But Gorbachev knew history poorly: as soon as tsarist Russia collapsed as a result of the bourgeois February revolution of 1917, then immediately its national bourgeois subjects (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus, Poland, Ukraine and the countries of the Caucasus) demanded national independence, since without it, the bourgeois system itself is in principle impossible.

Therefore, the SSG - in fact the Union of Capitalist States - was obviously Gorbachev's chimera: under state capitalism, the national elite rules. No one will share billions of dollars with the Center. As a result, Gorbachev repeated once again the history of tsarist Russia. As soon as he introduced capitalism, he immediately lost power over everything.

Whether Gorbachev understood this or not, he never said. But the fact is that he read the so-called "Burbulis memorandum" - after the name of the politician who replaced Gorbachev in his office, who is credited with authorship. This is supposedly a secret text of Yeltsin's advisers, which Gorbachev received long before the collapse of the USSR. The document has two important points.

1. “Before the August events, the leadership of Russia, opposing the old totalitarian regime, could rely on the support of the leaders of the vast majority of the union republics, who were striving to strengthen their own political positions. The liquidation of the old center invariably brings to the fore the objective contradictions between the interests of Russia and other republics. For the latter, the preservation of the existing resource flows and financial and economic relations for the transition period means a unique opportunity to reconstruct the economy at the expense of Russia. For the RSFSR, which is already experiencing a serious crisis, this is a serious additional burden on economic structures, undermining the possibility of its economic revival.

2. “Objectively, Russia does not need an economic center standing above it, engaged in the redistribution of its resources. However, many other republics are interested in such a center. Having established control over property on their territory, they seek to redistribute the property and resources of Russia through the allied bodies in their favor. Since such a center can exist only with the support of the republics, it will objectively, regardless of its personnel composition, pursue a policy that is contrary to the interests of Russia.

The position is understandable and absolutely correct: the format of state capitalism does not fit into the outdated union relations. For example, today Russia, having received hundreds of billions of dollars on oil speculation (selling it at exorbitant prices), would have to distribute most of the profits to the republics of Central Asia, where almost as many people live as in Russia itself, although these countries have nothing to do with Russian oil reserves. have.

Gorbachev's exclusion from the Constitution of the USSR-SSG and the Constitutions of the republics for the Novo-Ogarevsky agreements of the socialist property of the people on the means of production (and the country's subsoil) meant that from now on the Latvian and Tajik have no rights to the diamonds of Yakutia and the oil of Siberia. This is the END of the USSR. The division of the previously public property and the public bowels of the USSR into national apartments INEVITABLY leads to the disintegration of the country into national apartments. This is an axiom. For we in the USSR were united by our common all-Union people's property. As soon as it was gone, there was no general. This is the same as dissolving a collective farm, distributing tractors and cows to the families of the villagers - and then waiting from the sky again for some kind of "integration" of the villagers.

And the most important thing is that only Russia is so rich in all sorts of resources, and there are many neighbors of Russia who want to have them either for free or at bargain prices. But today Russia is already a grated kalach, and its neighbors cannot be fooled just like that, and in Russia itself there is such an abyss of problems that thinking about neighbors without solving them is simply bad in relation to your own people.

In general, as we parted ways in national apartments, so in the foreseeable future we will be in them. In full accordance with the teachings of Karl Marx. After all, Marxism does not provide for the reconstruction of the USSR from countries that have been capitalist for almost 20 years and are not going to get rid of their capitalism, because they live better that way. And the most important proof of this is the fact that our bourgeois countries of the CIS are ruled or ruled in these two decades by former members of the Politburo, the Central Committee of the CPSU and simply members of the CPSU, and even former Komsomol functionaries. None of them in the CIS has ever hinted at the fact that the people should return their socialist property of the people to the means of production, return the CPSU to power and return the Politburo as a governing body of the country. That is, the leaders, the former members of the Politburo and the first secretaries of the republics, fully agree with the state of affairs where they became presidents. That's the main thing for them.

But what about the party? But what about the idea? Everything is forgotten. Which once again proves the rottenness of our USSR. Who would have thought that the leaders of the CPSU from the Asian republics would suddenly become, OPENLY AND OPENLY, having received the presidency, the main capitalists in their homeland, and their relatives - the owners of factories, TV channels, hotels, oil wells? This metamorphosis was evident in advance, we were simply too sure of our ideals of youth. Isn't it crazy - the son of a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU or the Politburo of the USSR - a dollar millionaire? And this is now the NORM for almost everyone southern countries CIS.

WHO NEEDS A CONSPIRACY THEORY?

Why is the history of the collapse of the USSR not presented honestly in the mass of articles and films, but instead is monstrously distorted? Why are the main aspects missed - the Ukrainian referendum, the issue of the elimination of socialism in the USSR, Gorbachev's proposals to give autonomies republican status? Why is everyone reduced only to the "Bialowieza conspirators" and to the "intrigues of the West"? That is, to the Conspiracy Theory.

In my opinion, there are several reasons. I'll name the main ones.

1. The national elites of the CIS countries (former members of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Politburo, employees of the party apparatus and the Komsomol, the directors' corps, etc.) during the collapse of the USSR became the owners of the very property that was "nationwide" in the USSR. And the collapse of the USSR hides a completely different secret - already really from the framework of the Conspiracy Theory: the topic of privatization. That is, the theme of the division of public socialist property (and such a division of it with the people is obligatory when the country abandons socialism).

Few people know that it was not Chubais who invented vouchers, but the Gorbachev administration was the first to prepare the introduction of vouchers in the planned JIT. It is difficult to judge what would have come of this, but, apparently, it would have been the same as with the Chubais vouchers, because the Russian privatization program largely repeated the one that was developed for the SSG by the Gorbachev team and was proposed for signing and implementation in the Novo- Ogaryov agreements.

In fact, the privatization program was drawn up by those who then controlled the property of the USSR - and drawn up in such a way that they would become its main owners.

However, a similar privatization in Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, the GDR had a fair character: all the socialist property of the people was counted and evaluated - and divided by the number of inhabitants of the country. As a result, the share of each family turned out to be quite large: for vouchers, the family became the owner of a small store or a significant shareholder large enterprise, and in the mid-1990s, the share of "income from privatized property" in household income in these countries averaged 20 to 40% or more. In Russia, as you know, Chubais's voucher was sold for a bottle of vodka. That is, the entire socialist property of the RSFSR, created over 70 years of Russian labor into the "collective piggy bank of a large collective farm", was reduced to 150 million bottles of vodka.

The population of the CIS countries was deceived: in some countries, a handful of people (the former party nomenklatura and directors) became the owner of public factories and resources, in other countries state capitalism (that is, the bureaucracy) became their owner. Here, in order to hide this outright theft of public property from their people, the new owners do their best to hide this issue from consideration. And that is why the collapse of the USSR is considered selectively only as an administrative collapse of the country, avoiding discussion of the topic of the collapse of the socialist formation - because this issue is directly related to the question of HOW our public property was divided. And therefore, the new owners are extremely interested in hiding the history of their dishonest appropriation of this property and blaming everything on the "Belovezhsky conspirators", or even better - on the CIA or the West. Like, "if only to get away from us."

2. The collapse of the USSR was a blow to the mentality of those who thought in "imperial terms". AT recent times in Russia, the idea of ​​"Empire" has become very popular, and the USSR is already associated with "historical Russia" and the "Russian Empire", and in such myths the collapse of the USSR is erroneously presented already as the "collapse of Russia". It is clear that such an interpretation of the events of 1991 is not looking for real facts and reasons, but simply requires a mythical "anti-Russian conspiracy".

4. Populist leaders of the CIS countries (like, for example, Zhirinovsky with his LDPR party) speculate on the nostalgia of the marginal part of the population for the USSR - and therefore are also extremely interested in talking about the collapse of the USSR as a "conspiracy of our enemies."

5. Any executive power of the CIS countries itself is always interested in preserving the "Soviet traditions", because in the USSR there was no Civil Society capable of controlling it. The Soviet people have always been very easy to manage - like an obedient herd. Hence the cult of the USSR, the glorification of the USSR, the celebration of Soviet holidays and especially military ones - with the simultaneous scolding of Gorbachev's Perestroika and all its democratic achievements. Within the framework of this demagoguery, the lawlessness of the mid-1990s is blamed on Perestroika, and not at all on the rule of the new owners, who took away from the people their socialist property into their private or state-capitalist property. In this context, a true story about the history of the collapse of the USSR is simply impossible.

This specificity is fully reflected in the work of the structures of the CIS, where our unanimous desire for integration (as if recreating the USSR) is always declared, but in reality we are talking only about the design of our post-Soviet relations. For the real, and not in words, reconstruction of the USSR is a return to the socialist ownership of the people for the means of production and subsoil, which, when carried out, removes all obstacles to the unification of countries. That is, complete deprivation. And without the transfer of property and subsoil to the people, the reconstruction of the USSR is impossible in principle.

There is only another option - when, during the unification, it is not necessary to break the property system, transferring it from private to national, and even more so international with the united republics. This option was proposed by Putin: in order for the peoples of other CIS countries to become, as in the USSR, also involved in the resources of Russia, they should enter into its composition simply as new provinces - for Russia no longer intends to consider its resources "all-Union".

Life, as we see, shows that no revival of the USSR is possible in principle, since Russia and its structures (Gazprom in the first place) do not intend to share with the "fraternal peoples". Unless - with the complete refusal of the neighbors from all their statehood, which, however, does not make them co-owners of Russian resources. For no "USSR" is being revived (that is, the most popular socialist property of all republics for all means of production and subsoil).

It must be admitted that Yeltsin's advisers were right. Russia, according to Putin's definition, is an energy country, the main source of its income is the sale of energy resources. If Russia continued to share these revenues with the CIS countries, being with them in some kind of allied relations, then they would really solve their problems of state building (with the obvious prospect of future independence) at Russia's expense. In this regard, the "divorce of the republics" was most beneficial to Russia itself. Those huge incomes that Russia shared with other republics have now become only its income - and today they allow solving many of the accumulated sores and problems of the country: the problem of poverty, and the problem of meager salaries of doctors and teachers, and bad roads, and much, much more .

And, of course, Yeltsin's rejection of Gorbachev's plan to divide the RSFSR into autonomous states was also fateful for Russia. The demonization of all previous rulers of the country, which has been a tradition since the days of the USSR, also seems unfair. Brezhnev, accused of creating a "period of stagnation", nevertheless removed the executions of dissidents from our lives. Gorbachev, guilty of the collapse of the USSR, nevertheless created the rudiments of Civil Society and democracy in our country with his Perestroika. Yeltsin, in creating an oligarch class in an unfair privatization, was also convinced that he was serving the good of Russia by ridding her of communism and cannibalistic communist ideas. There can be no unambiguous historical assessments here.

Except one. The USSR - as a complete dead end in the history of Human Civilization - had to disintegrate for its own internal reasons back in the 1940s. He was saved only by the victory over Nazism in World War II, which immensely strengthened the position of the USSR in the world and veiled the problems of the system in the eyes of the population. Just like today North Korea"works out the last resources" from the fact of victory in the war with the United States. This cannot go on forever.

I don't see any difference between Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot. And if someone speaks of the collapse of the USSR as a "tragedy", then he equally calls the "tragedy" and the expulsion of Pol Pot from Kampuchea, who destroyed a third of the country's population in three years.

What is the collapse of the USSR for all of us: the administrative collapse of the country - or is it still the expulsion of radical communist cockroaches from our brains? Here is the question.

In my opinion, the second order is historically more important for us than the first. Therefore, the collapse of communism and the USSR with it is the greatest blessing and happiness for us, it is our return to universal values, to respect for human life and the human person. Let at least a hundred of the USSR disintegrate to achieve this goal - it's not a pity. For we are finally gaining a NORMAL state.

And when homo impericuses lament that, they say, “the collapse of the USSR is a great tragedy,” then with such an approach, the collapse of the Third Reich is also seen by homo impericus “ greatest tragedy century." In fact, the post-war Germans (whom the United States spent huge amounts of money on de-fascistization and de-imperialization) today consciously consider the collapse of the Third Reich to be their boon. The rejection of imperial ideas allowed Germany to create and Civil society(without which an efficient economy is impossible), and to focus the energy of the masses on the improvement of their country - instead of diverting it to "external conquests" and militarization. As a result, Germany defeated by us, having lost a third of the male population and burned to the ground, has become the leading economic power FROM ZERO, and the average wages and pensions in this country we have defeated are orders of magnitude higher than ours, the WINNERS.

The paradox lies in the fact that the rejection of imperial ideas and the desire to "rule the neighbors and the world" leads to the concentration of the efforts of the nation and state funds for the improvement of their country. Which gives visible results in improving the quality of life in the country - and becomes, as in anti-imperial Germany or Japan, just the OBJECT OF NATIONAL PRIDE. The country becomes GREAT in terms of its weight in world politics - but GREAT not because of its imperialism, but because it was able to improve itself wonderfully - and this created its weight in the international arena.

Somewhere in the second half of the twentieth century, the greatness of the country began to be determined not by the power of its armed forces and the number of nuclear missiles, but by the size of average salaries and pensions - and the degree of individual freedom in the State. From the point of view of ancient ideas from the Age of Empires, the USSR was quite strong as an Empire, because it had an incredible number of tanks and nuclear warheads. Why did it fall apart?

Alas, it turned out that the strength of the country no longer depends on the degree of its militarization. The so-called "human factor" has become the main one: a person has ceased to be a "cog in the system", without respect for his personality and without the development of his well-being - any most powerful nuclear power is weak, like a colossus on clay feet.

Supporters of the Conspiracy Theory see in the "forces that destroyed the USSR" one or another "intruder", while placing the people of the USSR itself outside the process of History. This, of course, is a huge delusion: to see in the Soviet people only an obedient and brainless herd, in love with the USSR. In reality, the Soviet people were then terribly tired of Gorbachev's demagogy - and even more exhausted by the catastrophic crisis in the economy, empty shelves in stores, huge queues for everything vital and the introduction card system. IT'S IMPOSSIBLE TO LIVE LIKE THIS - that was the main idea of ​​that era, common to everyone's understanding.

In search of a better future, the exhausted Soviet people abandoned the USSR.

SO WHO DESTROYED THE USSR?

Let's return to this main question, which, in my opinion, has its own answer.

A combination of circumstances, chaos and chaos, a power vacuum, as well as the separatism of Ukraine and other republics - do not explain the most important moment: why did the RSFSR, as supposedly the “Soviet and Russian Empire” (as almost everyone in Russia now say), did not take any steps against collapse of the USSR? That's the question!

Gorbachev retrospectively finds that "the president of Russia and his entourage actually sacrificed the Union to their passionate desire to reign in the Kremlin," and cites an episode about which he was told by one of the deputies of the Russian Supreme Soviet, who was in the past in the circle of Yeltsin's supporters:

“After returning from Minsk in December 1991, the President of Russia gathered a group of deputies close to him in order to enlist support for the ratification of the Minsk agreements. He was asked how legal they are. Unexpectedly, the president fell into forty minutes of reasoning, with inspiration telling how he managed to “hang noodles” on Gorbachev before going to Minsk, to convince him that he would pursue one goal there, while in fact he was going to do the exact opposite. "Gorbachev should have been taken out of the game," Yeltsin added. This attempt to shift their measure of historical responsibility onto Yeltsin alone is typical of all Gorbachev's memoirs, just as the communists of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation stubbornly do not want to remember that it was they who unanimously voted for the collapse of the USSR. According to Gorbachev, the communists also had a hand in the collapse of the USSR, who almost unanimously voted for the Belovezhskaya Accords and for Russia's secession from the USSR.

Nikolai Zenkovich in the book “Secrets of the outgoing century” cited above writes:

“Why did the communists vote so unanimously “yes”? Many did it, probably reluctantly. The general mood was expressed by pilot-cosmonaut V.I. Sevastyanov, who was a member of the Fatherland faction, said with relief: “Thank God, the era of Gorbachev is over.” They voted not against the USSR, as deputies repent today, but against the incapacitated center headed by Gorbachev. And to get rid of it, they liquidated the state.”

Yes, there was a confluence of circumstances. But after all, a mistake is always EASY TO FIX! And after all, they tried to fix it - the State Duma of the Russian Federation on March 15, 1996 adopted a resolution to cancel the decision of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR of December 12, 1991, which denounced the Treaty on the Formation of the USSR.

So what? Nothing. It turned out that another POWERFUL FORCE in Russia itself was extremely interested in the collapse of the USSR, which in 1996 spat on this decision of the State Duma, and in 1991 behind the scenes pushed the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR to denounce the Treaty on the creation of the USSR.

As always and in all cases, and in the history of the collapse of the USSR, we must ask the obligatory main question - who benefits most from this? The answer to it will name the main organizer of the EVENT. At the same time, as we will see, the collapse of the USSR itself is directly related to the collapse of precisely socialism in the USSR.

In his book, Zenkovich devoted two chapters to the collapse of the USSR, but did not name the main organizers of the collapse. And only in one sentence on page 571 does he give a “hint” to answer the main question (without realizing the essence of the topic here):

“Having retained 90 percent of all oil production former Union, Russia has lost 60 percent of its oil equipment production capacity, 35-40 percent of oil refining capacity and 60 percent of oil cargo throughput at seaports.”

What does the phrase “Having retained 90 percent of the entire oil production of the former Soviet Union” mean? It really means that in the USSR and Gorbachev's SSG project this "preservation" was not envisaged, oil was placed under the control of the Center (as well as gas, diamonds of Yakutia and other resources). And Yeltsin, by the collapse of the USSR, did not “SAVE” at all, but for the first time TAKEN these “90 percent of all oil production of the former Union” from the USSR-SSG to himself in Russia.

My version of the retrospective of events is as follows. When the Gorbachev team proposed to the republics the creation of the SSG within the framework of the Novo-Ogaryovo agreements with the rejection of socialism, with the privatization of socialist ownership of the means of production and subsoil and its division through privatization vouchers, the RSFSR began to consider this prospect.

The results of the reflections are in the “Burbulis Memorandum” quoted above, but it is only a reflection of the generally extremely acute problem of PROPERTY that arose during the transition of the USSR from socialism to capitalism.

The draft of Gorbachev's all-union privatization already took into account the wishes of the party-director's nomenklatura to take possession of this public property, and it was precisely such privatization that took place in the CIS countries and in the Russian Federation after the collapse of Gorbachev's country. Apparently, it is wrong to call Russian vouchers “Chubais vouchers”, since Gorbachev invented them for the USSR-SSG. It was absolutely clear that the main profitable “commodity” of the USSR was energy resources.

In Gorbachev's JIT project, privatization was supposed to be ALL-UNION: that is, Gazprom's shares were to be divided among the republics, and Russian 90 percent of the entire oil production of the USSR was to be divided with the Balts, Ukrainians, Belarusians and Moldovans, Asian and Caucasian republics - which together were more than the Russians themselves.

The injustice is obvious: Russia produces 90% of the oil of the USSR, which is the main source of income for the country of the USSR, but for some reason, when privatizing the USSR, the SSG must give it equally to the property of other republics. The directors of the energy-producing industries of the RSFSR, in discussing the planned privatization and in anticipation of becoming millionaires, flooded the government of the RSFSR with their letters, and it was on their basis that the “Burbulis Memorandum” was formulated.

As a result, the question was how, during the privatization of the USSR, the party-director corps of the RSFSR Snatch MORE. And much MORE came out in the event that the RSFSR would become a state independent of its neighbors, pretenders to freeloaders on Russian oil and gas.

And now, almost 20 years have passed since the collapse of the USSR, and we see that Russia's main income is the sale of energy resources, on which it grows immensely rich with the world's rising prices for them. The country's leadership defines the concept of Russia as an "energy power", the main governing force of the Russian Federation is Gazprom, and the billionaires of Russia are people of that party-director's corps who were at the origins of the privatization of Russia's mineral resources. Instead of Gorbachev's "division of the mineral resources of Russia between the republics", we see that the Russian Federation sells energy resources to the republics at world prices, and stops attempts to resent, although these "disturbances" are largely caused by the project of Gorbachev's SSG rejected by the RSFSR, where the mineral resources of Russia became equally privatized by all subjects THE USSR.

Strictly speaking, in a broad historical sense, the question is not who destroyed the USSR (if it was an accident and a temporary mistake), but who is preventing Russia from reunification into the Union for almost 20 years. The main obstacle to this is Gazprom and other energy companies of the Russian Federation, and personally their shareholders, dollar millionaires and billionaires. At the same time, their participation in the collapse of the USSR was the most important.

I repeat that the re-creation of the USSR is once again the unification into a common socialist exploitation of the mineral resources of our countries. The former “brothers” of Russia in the USSR do not have any such “special bowels”, except for Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan, well, also Kazakhstan. It is clear that these four ex-USSR republics absolutely do not want to make their subsoil again "common property" with their neighbors.

Of course, neither Yeltsin nor Putin, for the idea of ​​“recreating the USSR”, could no longer offer the CIS countries common ownership of the subsoil and energy production enterprises of the Russian Federation, since they belong to private owners and shareholders in the Russian Federation. I believe that the question “who destroyed the USSR?” and the question “who doesn’t need the USSR today?” - this is the same question, because all those who do not need the USSR today are equally involved in the events when the collapse of the USSR was carried out. For they became owners at that time.

But in any case, it should be recognized that the very epochal nature of the collapse of the USSR is so historically global that different points of view about these events are possible, and we will never find the “only historical truth”. Which gives full play to the most diverse concepts of the Conspiracy Theory - no matter how absurd they may sound. Some grain of truth, perhaps, lies in each such version of the collapse of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics - an odious state that went down in history and Yuri Gagarin, and the famine in Ukraine, and massive illegal repressions of its population, and the victory over Hitler, and the adoption of a law on the execution of 12-year-old children for a handful of rotting spikelets “kidnapped” from a harvested field. Like everyone else in life, there was everything: both the gloomy, eerie, and something that you can be proud of forever. In any case, the USSR is something lived and experienced, and again we will never enter “this river” a second time.

The collapse of the Soviet Union is in any case not an accident.
I will speak in simple everyday language, using an understandable image. Suppose there is some kind of family, husband and wife. They may have one child, two, three, five, ten, and so on. If such a couple in the role of husband and wife gets divorced - is it an accident or not? When a family falls apart, there is always a reason.
The USSR is a big family.
In a family conflict, everyone can have their own truth. Either the husband has a mistress, or the wife has a lover, or they are generally tired of each other, or something else. If two people are locked in the same room, they will get tired of each other anyway, they will get each other and eventually quarrel.
Between a man and a woman there is a sexual attraction, which is called love. Babies are not from love, but from sexual cravings. A similar process was observed in the Soviet Union. In the USSR, the friendship of peoples was preached and "everyone is equal" and, except for Russians, no one else believed in it. All the republics understood that the Russians were number one, and all the rest were secondary.
It is proved simply - the anthem of the USSR was performed in Russian, not in Ukrainian, not in Armenian, not in Kazakh, and not in any other. All spoke Russian. And the words in the anthem "... great Russia rallied forever ..." prove that the Russians knew that they were number one, that's why the anthem is sung like that - forever.
However, this "forever" fell apart. What collapsed?
Russia is a man in his psychology. And a man, as we usually do, should have one wife, and Ukraine turned out to be the most correct wife: in terms of population, territory, religion and history. And all the rest, it's like a mistress. For example, Belarus was a favorite mistress. But, let's say, Kyrgyzstan, we don't suck our beloved mistress. And mistresses are a costly and troublesome business, because funds are required to support and educate them.
Russian greatness is a demonstration of power to the whole world through the younger countries: Kyrgyzstan, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, etc. - was attractive to others: to Bulgaria, Vietnam .., and similar lagging countries in Africa.
When money becomes tight in a family, neither a mistress nor a wife will love such a husband. (There are exceptions, of course.)
On December 8, 1991, in Viskuli (Belovezhskaya Pushcha, Belarus) “there were top officials and heads of governments of the three union republics: Boris Yeltsin and Gennady Burbulis (RSFSR), Stanislav Shushkevich and Vyacheslav Kebich (BSSR), Leonid Kravchuk and Vitold Fokin (Ukraine). The preamble of the document stated that "The Union of the SSR as a subject of international law and geopolitical reality ceases to exist".(Wikipedia) I.e. they documented the collapse of the USSR. And Yeltsin "from a comfortable bear's lair, from a dark forest, a dense forest," called America and asked how they would look at this issue, what they would say. Here he is calling America, because he was told by these "secretaries" of Belarus and Ukraine. Shameless Yeltsin called America: Here my mistress is interested, and who will put on their shoes, dress them in such a difficult period of time. And other secretaries, including Nazarbayev N.A. I didn't have the courage to come together and say to Russia, Ukraine and Belarus: "If you don't like it, goodbye." Then an alliance of twelve or eight states would represent a real geopolitical economic strength. There were options for creating such an alliance.
* * *
Now let's move on to another "politically understandable" language.
What good can be said about the Union before the collapse. The Soviet Union lost more than two tens of millions of dead, but, nevertheless, won the Second World War. The war was won thanks to the support all countries because a little less than half were people from the union republics. Let's say 15 million were Russians, and the remaining 10 were Tajiks, Uzbeks, Kyrgyz ...
The USSR created everyone with the same incredible efforts atomic bomb and the military industry. Everyone served in the army, which means that somewhere around 30-40 percent were non-Russians. All the Union Republics were around Russia, and the geopolitical component, like the military component, was a ring around Russia. That is, if some army would try to capture Russia ... - and the capture of Russia is actually the capture of the entire Soviet Union - for example, Hitler sought to take Moscow, and not Tashkent, Ashgabat, Alma-Ata, etc. And Russia's contributions to these countries, as geopolitical military protection, are justified, since they would take the first blow from outside. In addition, there was another "ring" around all these republics - for example, Eastern Europe.
Those. The USSR, proceeding from the language, from the anthem, was a purely Russian empire, a friendly formation to all nations. Each formation, together with the Russian voice, felt strong and worthy. And Russia, as the main component of the USSR, generously shared its dignity and respect.
And the first part is about mistress-wives and the dark Forest, this is the story that turned out at the end. The story we see today. Where everyone is a bad mistress or a bad wife, but I was a good Russian husband. Everyone has their own truth.
Unfortunately, in all the republics that were connected with Russia by life and blood, today there are also not very happy memories. People from year to year in these countries speak Russian worse and worse. Thus, Russia is losing its conscious-intellectual and emotional connection with these countries. The worse they know Russian, the more they will move away from Russia and, as weaker countries, will be drawn into the orbits of stronger and more developed countries. Someone will start spinning around Europe, someone around China, someone around America, someone around Iran, someone around Turkey. And few people will stay with the Russians and share their fate with the Russians - a multinational, multi-confessional people.
For example, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, especially Azerbaijan are almost Turkic-speaking countries. They are already drawn into Turkey's orbit. Tajikistan - they speak the language of Iran. Ukraine - Russia left Crimea to them, left Sevastopol, there is a huge number of people who speak Russian, but, nevertheless, the Poles are closer to them today. The Poles, who, neither Sevastopol nor the Crimea, left them nothing at all. Moldova, gradually forgetting the Russian language, with Romania, which actually speaks the same language with it, enters into close relations with it. That is, that Ukraine, that Moldova, are looking for ways to Europe.
All this enumeration is necessary for understanding that if there is discord in the family, in search of the guilty one you can get so carried away that you stop understanding anything. Understand what is happening. Romania did not break up the USSR, Turkey, Iran did not break up the USSR. The USSR was destroyed by stupid, stupid to hopelessness management. The USSR was not destroyed by Gorbachev, the USSR was destroyed by Yeltsin. He so wanted to be the main and important that after him we cannot recover in any way. Unfortunately, during the time of Gorbachev, his perestroika did not go over to the Chinese rails. If this were so, then the anthem "... great Russia has united us forever ..." we would also sing in Russian.
Outcome
The management elite were senile "old farts" who had gone out of their minds. The USSR was destroyed by the party-oligarchic corrupt communist elite. And today, 20 years after the collapse, in our country, in Russia, the main enemy has come out, shown and identified himself. There was a word - corruption. It originated in the USSR, Gorbachev was unable to heal it in the Chinese way. Under Yeltsin, corruption became the norm of political, economic and everyday life.
And today there is a question: either corruption or Russia.

Socio-political, spiritual and economic problems in modern Russia
(In continuation of the essay on the topic: "The collapse of the USSR: an accident or ...?")

My history teacher was given an essay topic. Answering this question, I did not use documents, did not play with numbers, did not consider in detail the politicians of that time. I used the thoughts, experience and worldly wisdom of those people whose active age at that time was from 30 to 40 years. In modern Russia, they lived for about 20 years. Today they are over 50.
They have something to compare. After listening closely to that period, I wrote an essay based on their experience and worldly wisdom that is understandable to me, my friends and adults of all ages. But, nevertheless, a historian I respected marked the essay "The collapse of the USSR: an accident or ...?" - "sluggish".
I will try to supplement the previous essay in a nutshell so that it is not sluggish, and fill this essay with new topic about socio-political, spiritual and economic problems of modern Russia. I decided to talk to the same people with whom I talked about the not accidental collapse of the Soviet Union.
Thus, I do not build my texts on history books, because they describe the actions of politicians: this one did this, and this one did this. But their actions don't describe real life people, and the country has two stories. In one history of the country there are politicians, and in the other history of the country there are most of population, which, as it were, has nothing to do with history. As if this is some kind of inert, weak-willed mass, which, like clay, is rumpled by politicians. And politicians are elected by this very mass, and this very mass is waiting for politicians to improve their own lives. And the adults with whom I talked, talked, saw the USSR live and, years later, understood what was happening in the country. In a country where information was hidden, in a country where there was no freedom of speech, in a country where information deception was the norm. Politicians born in the USSR deceived adult smart people, but they believed them. Informationally, they were so zombified that they believed that they were being led to some wonderful communist future, where there would be equality, brotherhood, friendship of peoples for everyone, and where there would be only one freedom for everyone. And they believed, because the symptoms of everything that was said were clearly traced.

Let me remind you how the previous essay ends:
"Outcome.
The management elite were senile pensioners who had gone out of their minds. The USSR was destroyed by the party-oligarchic corrupt communist elite. And today, 20 years after the collapse, in our country, in Russia, the main enemy has come out, shown and identified himself. There was a word - corruption. It originated in the USSR; Gorbachev could not heal it in the Chinese way (corruption is indestructible and incurable, it can only be treated).
And today the question is: either corruption or Russia."

Under Yeltsin, corruption became the norm of political, economic and everyday life. Thus, under Yeltsin, deception swept the whole country, and such abnormality became the norm. In such conditions .. what kind of spirituality, politics and economics can we talk about?
I wrote that modern Russia is a legacy of the Soviet Union. These are those who ruled for 21 years before Gorbachev: L.I. Brezhnev (1966-1982), Yu.V. Andropov (1982-1984), K.U. Chernenko (1984-1985). That is, the Soviet Union was ruled by old, sick and economically illiterate people. We need to think about what a sick person can think about - about the state or about his health? A doctor usually prescribes rest for a sick person. And politics, as far as I understood from adults, is the art of intrigue. And intrigue is anxiety, intrigue-anxiety is the same as giving a patient not medicine, but poison. The art of intrigue is the art of holding oneself correctly and sincerely on the political stage, regardless of the truth or not the truth, and so on. Such, in general, deceitful behavior, with the right facial expression, has become the norm in politics: a game of sincerity, a game of truth, and after the first handshake, call each other friends. Such a game of deceit can cripple any person, in fact, this is a split personality, and it is difficult to talk about spirituality in such a playing person. Traces of corruption are lost between split personalities in one person. To catch such an honest thief by the hand ...
As I understood from the reasoning of adults, there are two fundamental concepts for the country: Motherland and State. So the state is run by officials, they govern through the law; and concept justice for officials - not a spiritual concept. And the Motherland is for those who live in the country of Russia and do not govern the state. For them justice is a spiritual concept, not a law. (As a result, there is a conflict between law and spirituality.)

That is, a conflict arises between those who govern the state and between those for whom it is the homeland. (Do not confuse the modern democratic spiritual concept of equality, freedom with a religious spiritual concept.)
The USSR was ruled by senile people for at least 10 years - these are the last years of Brezhnev and those who were before Gorbachev. The socially directed state - the USSR, was ruled by sick political intriguers. Also, they were managers illiterate in economics. They were passionate about themselves, their insatiable families, and their selfishness was boundless. And therefore they are spiritless persons, both in the modern and in the religious sense. Spiritual people love people, and unspiritual people love themselves.

The problems of modern Russia begin from the USSR, from these soulless, not loving people, political senile. And modern Russia was built by B.N. Yeltsin - a man from their communist environment, only was younger, more energetic. And people believed him that this young and energetic Yeltsin will improve both the state and the Motherland. I didn’t see him myself, but the adults remembered that at first he was, indeed, a very strong person, who, in front of his eyes, suddenly suddenly appeared as a drunkard, showing his essence. He, as the heir-student of Soviet retired senile politicians, eventually turned into a creature like them. That is, internal political intrigues acted on him in exactly the same way, not as a medicine, but as a poison. He rejoiced at his intriguing victories and forgot about the state and the people for whom this state is their homeland.
He destroyed the USSR; the economy of all the republics was tied to Russia. And all the logistics came from the center, from the Kremlin. He put Russian people and non-Russian people through the collapse of the economy of the whole country under extinction. (Those who had oil were lucky in the end - the price of oil rose. And those who did not have oil were pushed to the brink of extinction.)
On TV, the leader of Russia was either sick or half-drunk. What can be in such conditions, with such management, the socio-political or spiritual or economic life of Russia, if the guarantor of social, spiritual and economic stability is either drunk, or sick, or he doesn’t give a damn about everyone, both Russians and not in Russian.

The beginning of the 90s turned out to be frankly gangster. All adults who are under 50 and over remember alive how at every stall, in leather jackets, young people pushed each other and found out who was “protecting” whom here. And they, the poor fellows, just wanted to eat. At least most of them. The whole country was involved in petty-money showdowns. Banditry during the Yeltsin era was openly street in nature. And, under the guise of such banditry, the country was sawn between the oligarchs according to the law; not by justice, but by written laws. And here we are growing from there - from the troubled nineties. As a result, today's main topic is corruption and the fight against it.(Question: will the fight against corruption be legal or fair?)
And politics is an intriguing business: where is the truth, where is not the truth, it is very difficult to understand for an inexperienced person. Who is corrupt and who is not is very difficult to understand for an inexperienced person. And who catches whom, and why catches is also very difficult to understand for an inexperienced young man.

In times of crisis, Europe's fight against immodest super profits looks like "calming the crowd", and this works for politicians. They are gaining points, maybe for the next election. This is in Europe. And we are not quite Europe. It’s been 500 years for them as a democracy, and we have people for whom the country is their homeland, while they don’t think of the law: they want justice, and therefore, when V.V. Putin enters into a conversation with the people, the people turn to him personally: to him, and not to the law. (For those who manage the law, it turns out that this is a business, therefore they are corrupt officials, but justice is important for people, and the law is not business for them).
People for whom the country is the Motherland pay taxes, that is, they benefit. And the people who run the state... they distribute taxes... But corruption is such that it covers the entire population, and everyone, without exception, suffers from it. Let's say there is no state. Where will the officer be paid? And where will he get his envelopes? And, as adults explained to me, it is impossible to get rid of corruption, it can be reduced so that the state does not fall apart. The state for thinking corrupt officials is a business, and only crazy people can destroy their business. In the 90s, this is exactly what happened - the destruction of the state, because all the money went offshore. Today, corruption can be reduced, but it cannot be eliminated.

* * *
If Russia inherited corruption from the USSR, then the question arises: did the USSR really give birth to corruption?
When the Soviets came to power in 1917, they did not know how to govern the state, because they were absolutely incompetent in this matter. They invited and forced the officials who really controlled tsarist Russia, managed its economy. And the economy is responsible for social stability, and social stability is the basis of strong political power.
If the economy is strong political power, people, social strata are balanced and harmonized, then a subtle spiritual connection arises between the strata of society which can be expressed in one word - justice. Such a society feels whole and protected.
Tsarist power fell from a small handful of Bolsheviks, which means that the first World War Russia plunged into a deep economic crisis. The families of Russia, and these are mostly peasants, are tired of losing their male breadwinners. No breadwinner means hunger. So it was.

I have a father and mother, with them I feel protected. I have been taken care of since childhood, and since childhood I remember the constantly warm hands of my mother. Every family, like a child, wants such an attitude from the state. When families lose breadwinners who are not fighting for their country, it means that this is an unjust war. Because the First World War is a political war, that is, a war of international intriguers. A just war is to defend your homeland, and those who help defend their homeland are true friends. Eventually, unjust war for tsarist Russia became main reason her collapse.
And then the Bolsheviks began to manage the former tsarist state, inviting and forcing tsarist officials. And each official was assigned his spy, "an Octobrist, a pioneer, a Komsomol member and a communist." A communist revolutionary studied with an official, then he taught a Komsomol member, a Komsomol member taught a pioneer, a pioneer passed on knowledge to an Octobrist and, as a result, this Octobrist became a pioneer, became a Komsomol member, became a communist, became a revolutionary and eventually collapsed the USSR. And the corrupt tsarist officials, who understood what the state was and served their state, remained in the distant 1917. Those who replaced them only knew how to fight and destroy, but they never learned to govern the state and serve the state.
As a result, the form of management was perverted. Even before that, under the tsar, she was on denunciations, and in the USSR, informing simply became the norm of life.
I cited my family as an example - what child will be happy without a father? The government that didn't give a damn about the breadwinners is rotten, so a bunch of Bolsheviks overthrew her. True, nothing good happened, it began Civil War, a global purge began, millions of people were destroyed. And the purge was started not by Stalin, but by Lenin. And Stalin completed it as a faithful disciple of Lenin.
I remind you of this, because at the same pace as in 1917, the Soviet Union collapsed - overnight. In the Forest, at night, three secretaries communist party Russia, Ukraine, Belarus destroyed the Soviet Union and, in fact, formally, for weight, they invited the secretary of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan. (December 8, 1991, the leaders of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine in Belovezhskaya Pushcha signed an agreement to create a commonwealth of independent states. Nazarbayev is one famous example of resentment, and there were fifteen republics).
Considering these two experiences, in modern Russia it is necessary to draw a conclusion and remember that the powerful tsarist Empire collapsed, and the even more powerful - the USSR, collapsed overnight. And we need to understand this not by numbers, what and what happened in what years, but by the essence of the question: why did this happen? This happened because between people for whom the country is the Motherland and for whom the country is the state, the spiritual connection that binds society into one whole has been lost. And she was lost from the impoverishment of some and from the enrichment of others. The impoverished and the rich seem to speak the same language, but these are people, as if from different countries, one country is called the Motherland, and the other - the State.
* * *
Looking at Russia today, we see how the head of state is trying to fight corruption. What can be useful if corruption is defeated by at least 10 percent? This is the return of capital back to the treasury. This can improve the lives of pensioners, help the sick, put our roads in order, and everyone needs roads, both ordinary people and the economy. Let's imagine that the price of oil does not rise, and 10 percent of corruption is the same as the price of oil has skyrocketed.
The fight against corruption is another opportunity, like oil, to incredibly enrich Russia. What if it's 20 percent? or quite unbelievable, to defeat corruption by 30 percent? This overnight Russia will become a third richer.
Social welfare policies attract people. Spirituality, as an intelligible ideology, unites people. And the economy-contains such an association.

If the economy is weak, then spirituality, as a coherent ideology that unites politicians and people, will be weak. And weakness does not unite, but separates - this is proved by historical experience. Today's weakness is proved by the fact that the official began to be brought under accountability: "Where do you get all this from, if everyone is impoverished?" Well, let's say they forgot the 17th year, but the collapse of the USSR was literally yesterday. There, the secretaries with their families grew fat non-stop, and the people for whom the country of the USSR was the Motherland, became impoverished. The situation is dangerously repeating itself.
Today's fight against corruption is a consequence of the economic crisis that has engulfed the whole world. During a crisis, the owner begins to count money: income-expenses, just as it happens in any normal family. And waste leads to ruin.
What is the conclusion? Unfortunately, the fight against corruption is necessary measure . Because if there had not been a global crisis, then the fight against corruption in our country probably would not have existed, or it would have been sluggish. Corruption is being fought in Europe, and we have begun to fight it, because we are economically interpenetrating with Europe, and our corruption harms both us and them. Our corruption harms the real sector of the international economy, puts spokes in the wheels of development.
Imagine the crisis is over. As a result, will the fight against corruption end or not? Will the fight against corruption in today's Russia bog down or not? And by the next elections it will be clear how much the president has dealt with corruption: by 5, 10 percent - by how much?
I don't understand much about economic numbers, but the adults explained that 10 percent is a lot. 20 percent means there will be no economic everyday problems in Russia. And 30 percent - we will firmly stand on our feet, and they will reckon with us, as they reckoned with the USSR, as they reckoned with the Russian Empire.
Concluding the topic, we can say that the socio-political, spiritual and economic problems of modern Russia are a legacy from tsarist Russia. Only if in tsarist Russia corruption was a child, then in the USSR it matured, and in Russia it became a businessman.
Thus, until corruption is defeated by at least 10 percent, the socio-political, spiritual and economic development of Russia will be problematic, both within the country and in the world.

perestroika collapse of the soviet union

In the early 1970s, all concepts of the turn to a market economy were dealt a blow. The very word "market" has become a criterion of ideological unreliability. Since the second half of the 70s. the organization of industrial production began to change. Production research and production associations (NGOs) appeared. The practical result of such measures was only gigantism. The desired merging of science and production did not happen. On the other hand, during these years, the merger, the interweaving of the official economy with the shadow one, proceeded quickly and successfully. different kind semi-legal and illegal production and trading activities in which entire enterprises were involved. The incomes of the shadow economy amounted to many billions. By the beginning of the 80s. the ineffectiveness of attempts at limited reform of the Soviet system became apparent. The country entered a period of deep crisis.

Due to these and many other reasons, by the mid-80s. the possibility of a gradual, painless transition to a new system of social relations in Russia was hopelessly missed. The spontaneous degeneration of the system changed the entire way of life of Soviet society: the rights of managers and enterprises were redistributed, departmentalism and social inequality intensified. The nature of production relations within enterprises has changed, the labor discipline, apathy and indifference, theft, disrespect for honest work, envy of those who earn more have become widespread. At the same time, non-economic coercion to work persisted in the country. The Soviet man, alienated from the distribution of the produced product, has turned into a performer who works not according to conscience, but under compulsion. The ideological motivation of labor developed in the post-revolutionary years weakened along with the belief in the imminent triumph of communist ideals, in parallel with this, the flow of petrodollars was reduced and the external and internal debt of the state grew.

In the early 80s. without exception, all sections of Soviet society suffered from lack of freedom, experienced psychological discomfort. The intelligentsia wanted genuine democracy and individual freedom.

Most workers and employees associated the need for change with the best organization and wages, a more equitable distribution of social wealth. Part of the peasantry hoped to become the true owners of their land and their labor.

Ultimately, however, completely different forces determined the direction and nature of the reform of the Soviet system. These forces were the Soviet nomenclature, weighed down by communist conventions and the dependence of personal well-being on official position.

Thus, by the beginning of the 80s. the Soviet totalitarian system is actually deprived of support in society and ceases to be legitimate. Its collapse becomes a matter of time.

The first concrete step towards political reform was the decision of the extraordinary twelfth session of the USSR Supreme Council (eleventh convocation), which took place on November 29 - December 1, 1988. The USSR Armed Forces with real power functions, as well as a change in the electoral system, primarily the introduction of elections on an alternative basis.

1989 was a year of radical change, especially in the political structure of society. The elections of people's deputies of the USSR held in 1989 (March-May) were preceded by an election campaign unprecedented in our country, which began at the end of 1988. The possibility of nominating several alternative candidates (9505 candidates were nominated for 2250 deputy seats) finally gave Soviet citizens choose one of several.

A third of people's deputies were elected from public organizations, which allowed the communists, as the most massive " public organization to have a majority at the Congress, or, as they say in civilized countries, a lobby. This was announced as an achievement: the share of communists among people's deputies turned out to be 87% against 71.5% of the previous convocation, on the basis of which a loud conclusion was made that in the conditions of freedom of choice the authority of the party was confirmed.

In the elections held on March 26, 1989 in 1500 territorial and national-territorial districts, 89.8% of those included in the voter lists participated. These elections were a noticeable shift in society towards democracy, at least as it seemed at the time. The entire country followed the work of the Congress - a decrease in labor productivity was recorded everywhere.

The First Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR (May 25 - June 9, 1989) became a very major political event. Never before has there been such a thing in the history of this country.

Of course, now one can look with irony at the battles that took place at the Congress, but then it looked like a victory for democracy. There were few practical results of the Congress, in particular, a new USSR Supreme Council was elected. Several general decrees were adopted, for example, the Decree on the main directions of the domestic and foreign policy of the USSR.

The discussions at the Second Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR (December 12-24, 1989) were more businesslike than at the first Congress. The Second Congress adopted 36 normative acts, incl. 5 laws and 26 regulations. One of the central issues on the agenda of the Second Congress of People's Deputies was the discussion of measures to improve the economy. The issue of combating organized crime was discussed. The congress considered the reports of the commission devoted to both foreign policy issues (assessment of the non-aggression pact between the USSR and Germany of August 23, 1939, political assessment of the entry of Soviet troops into Afghanistan in 1979) and domestic political issues (on the Gdlyan investigative group, on the events in Tbilisi April 9, 1989, on privileges)...

When the First Congress of People's Deputies opened, many pinned their hopes for a better life on it. But, like many hopes of our people, they were not destined to come true. The First Congress is now called the "game of democracy", which, in fact, it was. By the Second Congress, people's interest had noticeably subsided. It has already become clear to the people that it is impossible to make life better with one magical stroke. The reform of the electoral system was a necessary thing, but it gave the people little concrete, vital.

Introduction to the presidency.

In the summer-autumn of 1989, the reformers in the CPSU, who did not want to get rid of the tenacious embrace of the conservatives, gave the democrats the opportunity to gain political strength and influence, allowed them to present center-right unity in the CPSU as a strategic line, and not as a temporary tactical maneuver. The situation in the country required a resolute development of a course towards a mixed economy, towards the creation rule of law and the conclusion of a new union treaty. All this objectively worked for the Democrats.

By the winter of 1989/90, the political situation had changed significantly. Gorbachev, fearing, not without reason, that the spring elections in the republics would lead to the victory of radical forces (Democratic Russia, the RUH and others), who immediately - following the example of the Baltic States - would try to take an independent position in relation to the Supreme Soviet of the Union headed by him, took a step , against which he and his like-minded people opposed a few months ago. Using his authority in the Supreme Soviet of the USSR headed by him, he managed - with the resistance of the Interregional Deputy Group - to pass a decision on the establishment of the post of President of the USSR. Having become President, Gorbachev received broad political powers and thereby greatly strengthened his power in the country.

Then the political struggle turned to state level. There was an actual multi-authority, in which the union and republican structures could neither act without regard to each other, nor come to an agreement among themselves. The "war of laws" between the Union and the republics was fought with varying success, and by the winter of 1990/91 reached its climax due to the tragic events in the Baltic states, the struggle over the Union Treaty and the Union budget. All this happened against the background of the rapid collapse of the economy, interethnic confrontation between the republics and within them.

As a result, there has been another shift in the mindset of society. After the democrats came to power in the large industrial centers of Russia and Ukraine, a lot of time passed, but the situation continued to worsen. Moreover, democracy was clearly degenerating into anarchy, intensifying the yearning for a “strong hand”. Similar sentiments also seized the Supreme Soviet of the USSR: in December, fearing an unpredictable development of events, it delegated additional powers to the President, and at the same time additional responsibility. Gorbachev, in January of this year, formed a new Cabinet of Ministers, in which representatives of the "enlightened" bureaucracy and the military-industrial complex took key posts.

Speaking of the USSR, one must make a significant reservation about the first president of the Soviet Union, who became Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev, since this also played a role in the history of the USSR, in particular in the collapse. Gorbachev's election to office Secretary General The Central Committee of the CPSU was not at all predetermined by the alignment of political forces. There was, according to Mikhail Sergeevich himself, another candidate. But as a result of a hidden, hardware game inaccessible to a mere mortal, it was his team that won.

Naturally, Gorbachev needed to consolidate his grip on power. And in order to ideologically justify his fight against the "sclerotic gerontocrats", the old party guard, he was forced to proclaim a course towards the renewal of socialism with its leading and guiding force - the CPSU. At first, in April, when the people mourned over the alcohol campaign, personnel changes began. One after another, the party leaders of the regions and republics went on a well-deserved rest. The cleaning of the apparatus was led by the now forgotten Yegor Kuzmich Ligachev, and in two years he coped with his task - he seated dedicated people to all key positions.

On this, all party "perestroikas" before Gorbachev, as a rule, ended, but Ligachev's influence in the party increased so much that the Secretary General felt the competitor's breath in the back of his head. And before the new nomenklatura had time to fall to the trough, Gorbachev announced that perestroika was continuing.

However, it was not so easy to "topple" Ligachev in the party arena, and Gorbachev, in the end, had to create alternative structures in the form of the Supreme Soviet and the Congress of People's Deputies in order to keep the apparatchiks in constant voltage. In sitting on two chairs at once, Gorbachev found undoubted benefits for himself: the partycrats could always be intimidated by the democrats, and the democrats by the glory of the CPSU.

The struggle in the political arena of the country was mainly around two points. The first is the general scenario for the development of perestroika. Will it be a gradual ingrowth of the established management structures into a market economy and the introduction of state-bureaucratic capitalism "from above"? Or, on the contrary, the liquidation of these structures and the spontaneous formation of capitalism "from below"?

The second key point is that since reforms require deliberately unpopular measures, the responsibility for their adoption and all the costs associated with them are, as a rule, assigned to political opponents. Most often, the Center acted as a "scapegoat". This manifested itself, for example, in the course of a political scandal that erupted in the Supreme Soviet of Russia, when the Union government announced the decision to introduce negotiated prices for a number of goods (in November 1990). Meanwhile, this decision was agreed with B.N. Yeltsin, and with I.S. Silaev. There are also known cases where

The center itself found a “goat”: the five percent sales tax introduced by presidential decree, which took a little less than a billion (931.5 million) rubles from the pocket of the population in January-February 1991 alone, was “blanked” on the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR.

By the end of 1990, a stalemate was established: neither the communist reformers nor the liberals could, individually, achieve positive changes in the economy, politics, social sphere. The main thing is that they could not stand alone against the threat of general anarchy. The first - because they have largely lost the support of the people, the second - because after their first victories they managed to lose many of their adherents.

The understanding of the need for a political compromise was observed both in one and in the other camp. In their documents of the second half of 1990, reformist communists (and even conservative communists represented by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the RSFSR) called for civil accord, expressed their readiness to create not just a bloc of “socialist orientation” forces, but to enter into an alliance with all democratic parties and movements. Their opponents, having taken a sip in resolving the practical issues that they faced when they came to power at the local, and in some places at the republican level, also seemed to be internally ready for cooperation. The idea of ​​a compromise with a part of the apparatus and the center and the creation of a strong executive power is, for example, the leitmotif of G.Kh. Popov, entitled not without a claim: "What is to be done?". The idea of ​​civil accord through the suspension or complete dissolution of all political parties became popular by the end of 1990 and flashed on different flanks of the liberal democratic movement. A.A. also spoke about this. Sobchak, and the leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia V.V. Zhirinovsky. The liberals, apparently, realized that their time was running out before it had even begun.

The political wind rose of perestroika has changed yet again. The most acute crisis of the existing political system. Having proclaimed the slogan "All power to the Soviets!", the reformers did not even think about the fact that the Soviets, which had ceased to be the driving belts of the CPSU, were not in a position to organize a normal process of political development. The press of the CPSU sharply criticized the "incompetent democrats" who did not know how to organize the work of those Soviets in which they had the majority. "Incompetent democrats" pointed to "sabotage" by the former ruling caste - the apparatus of executive power, mafia structures. However, the essence of the matter goes deeper. The political crisis of the end of 1990 is the result not so much of incompetence or sabotage as of an obsolete type of statehood.

Each political force sought to find its own way out of this crisis. The "state classes" reacted most painfully to it - those strata whose very existence was now at stake. They increasingly pushed the President and the Supreme Soviet of the USSR to establish an authoritarian presidential regime under nominal Soviet power. Gorbachev, although not without hesitation, was forced to go for it. He needed support, but there was nowhere to get it: the CPSU lost its mobilization abilities, and cooperation with the liberals did not work out - the inertia of confrontation affected.

However, even if it had taken shape, the authoritarian transformation of the regime could hardly have been avoided. For liberals - in any case, those of them who make the weather on the political horizon, considered the strengthening of executive power, authoritarian methods of transition to a market economy as something long-term, and not as a temporary tactical measure, therefore, strictly speaking, not only democrats, but and they were liberals except in quotation marks. It was enough to read the draft Constitution of Russia to see that the totalitarian regime is supposed to be replaced not by universal democracy, but by authoritarian power. At the same time, however, unlike the communist reformers, the liberals aimed at changing the foundation of the political system, at transforming Soviet power into a parliamentary republic.

The year 1990 was marked by the unilateral decision of some union republics (primarily the Baltic ones) to self-determine and create independent nation-states.

Attempts by the allied center to influence these decisions by economic measures were ultimately unsuccessful. A wave of declaring the sovereignties of the union republics, electing their own presidents, and introducing new names swept across the country. The republics sought to get rid of the dictates of the center by declaring their independence.

The real danger of the uncontrolled collapse of the USSR, threatening with unpredictable consequences, forced the center and the republics to look for a way to compromises and agreements. The idea of ​​concluding a new union treaty was put forward by the popular fronts of the Baltics as early as 1988. But until mid-1989, it did not find support either from the political leadership of the country or from people's deputies who had not yet freed themselves from the remnants of imperial sentiments. At that time, it seemed to many that the contract was not the main thing. The center finally “ripened” to realize the importance of the Union Treaty only after the “parade of sovereignties” changed the Union beyond recognition, when the centrifugal tendencies gained strength.

It is impossible not to mention the putsch in 1991, since it accelerated the process of the collapse of the USSR, that is, after the putsch, the USSR actually ceased to exist.

The signing of the new Union Treaty, scheduled for August 20, 1991, prompted the conservatives to take decisive action, since the agreement deprived the top of the CPSU of real power, posts and privileges. According to the secret agreement between M. Gorbachev, B. Yeltsin and the President of Kazakhstan N. Nazarbayev, which became known to the chairman of the KGB V. Kryuchkov, after the signing of the agreement, it was supposed to replace the Prime Minister of the USSR V. Pavlov N. Nazarbayev. The same fate awaited the Minister of Defense, Kryuchkov himself, and a number of other high-ranking officials.

However, on the night of August 19, 1991, President of the USSR M.S. Gorbachev was forcibly removed from power. A group of high-ranking officials, which included Vice President G. Yanaev, KGB Chairman V. Kryuchkov, Defense Minister D. Yazov, Prime Minister V. Pavlov, formed the self-proclaimed, unconstitutional State Committee for the State of Emergency in the USSR (GKChP).

By decrees of the State Emergency Committee in a number of regions of the country, mainly in the RSFSR, a state of emergency was introduced, rallies, demonstrations, and strikes were prohibited. The activities of democratic parties and organizations, newspapers were suspended, and control over the mass media was established.

But, only three days the GKChP was able to hold on to power, from the first days running into the active resistance of the Russians.

I myself, of course, would hardly write about it. It's trite for me and it's lazy just to write so many letters. But then one of my friends was asked at the university to write an essay on this topic. As I found out, I immediately volunteered to help, to troll the scoop once again - for me it is always a holiday. Here's what happened. Considering that the text was not written from my point of view, I tried to move away from my style as much as possible, not to use harsh value judgments, and in general to make it somehow look like an essay by an apolitical first-year girl. I was inspired, as always, by the work of Alexander Petrovich.

So, the collapse of the USSR: regularity or malicious intent.

"The topic of the collapse of the Soviet Union is one of the most controversial and most mysterious for the townsfolk. If you ask a person who does not have more or less deep knowledge in the field of economics and politics, he is unlikely to be able to clearly answer this question. Most of the people with whom I had a chance to talk on this topic either frankly admit that they do not know, or suggest various fantastic scenarios that are not supported by any factual material - the redistribution of power at the top, the machinations of Americans and dissidents and other "conspiracy theories".
Here we immediately come to the second version of the collapse of the Union, indicated in the topic - malicious intent. Of course, the Empire had many internal and external enemies, but I could not find any factual material that allows me to talk about the intrigues of enemies. Yes, and in various articles and books that talk about the death of the USSR, there are also no serious facts - only speculation of varying degrees of fantasticness. It is also difficult to imagine how, in reality, someone could deliberately harm an already rapidly collapsing country. It is possible that some actions of the then leaders of the Soviet Union pushed the country to disintegration, but they were not its cause, but only accelerated the inevitable process. In addition, an analysis of the reforms of the late USSR suggests that the people who made the decisions were absolutely sincerely mistaken, and the mistakes were due rather to a lack of economic knowledge among the members of the Politburo (most of whom were from the countryside with an appropriate level of education) and faith in communism, the power of the planned economy and the sinfulness of market mechanisms.
At the same time, there are more than enough facts testifying to the laws of the collapse of the country. Let's start with the fact that the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics suffered disintegration already in its very name. It collapsed precisely because it was SOCIALIST. What is socialism, after all? This is an artificial equalization of the incomes of all elements of society. However, even from the course of physics, we know that in order for work to be done, a potential difference is needed - energy flows from points with higher potentials to points with lower ones. When there is no potential difference, no work is done, and the thermal death of the system occurs. And society lives by the same laws. In it, the potential difference is provided by a shortage of resources, the competition for which is the driving force of society.
Society in the Soviet Union was organized, to put it simply, on the principle of "take away and divide", formulated by Sharikov in "Heart of a Dog". The purpose of the distribution machine of the USSR was an approximately equal distribution of benefits between all members of society, that is, an almost zero difference in wealth, and therefore an almost zero energy of society. In such a society, it is pointless to create and produce something beyond measure (unless, of course, the party orders under pain of execution) - they will still take it away. By the way, that is why civilization developed so slowly under feudalism - it was unprofitable for the peasants to increase production, because the surplus was taken away by the landowner, and the feudal lords themselves had no incentive to somehow improve productivity and work in general - they were fed by serfs.
And therefore, in order for such a system, doomed to heat death, to somehow function, it must be fed from the outside. For the USSR, such fuel was first the peasants, the brushwood of all the global projects of the last century. The exploitation of the countryside is generally one of the most striking sources of growth for totalitarian regimes. An example of this, in addition to the Union, is China and other countries of the socialist camp. There was even a certain regularity - as soon as the demographic scales of a socialist country exceeded the equilibrium point, that is, as soon as the population in cities compared with the number of inhabitants in rural areas, the economy began to slow down and collapse. This is what the statistics say. If we look at the graphs of socio-economic and demographic processes in the USSR (the dynamics of GDP, labor productivity, production of consumer goods, agricultural products, nominal wages, retail trade turnover at current prices, etc.), then almost all of them have a sharp turning point of approximately in the mid-sixties, when the number of urban residents in the country caught up with the number of villagers. The reason is clear: the rise and very existence of industry in the socialist countries was carried out at the expense of slave agriculture, from which everything was sucked to the limit, as under feudalism.
After that, the country turned into a completely raw material. The USSR lived solely by selling oil. With this money, products and equipment were purchased. And then, when in the early 80s the price of oil fell sharply (more than 3 times in 6 years), the Soviet Union began to take loans en masse from other countries, which Russia, the legal successor of the USSR, cannot repay until now. It was loans from abroad that, at the decline of the empire, became the fuel that forced the energy-neutral system of socialism to work at the very least. But it was impossible to take out loans indefinitely, and our own industry and Agriculture could not provide the country with everything necessary, more and more food had to be purchased every year, which ultimately led to natural famine and decay, which in that situation was the only way to save the population from starvation. Anatoly Chernyaev, an aide to President Gorbachev, left the following note about that time (1991): “The harvest is dying, communications are torn, deliveries are stopped, there is nothing in stores, factories stop, transport workers go on strike. What will happen to the Union? I think that by the new year we will not have a country ... There is a shortage of bread. Thousands of queues at those bakeries where it is ... We are on the verge of a bloody catastrophe ... "Now many people like to speculate about whether it was possible to save the Soviet Union. But by that time there was nothing left to save. And all the hardships of the nineties were caused by no means by the reforms of the beginning of the decade, but by the legacy of the late Union, which haunted the country for a long time. So, as we see, the collapse of the USSR is a clear pattern. No malicious intent is needed for a fundamentally non-working system to die.
The regularity of such conclusions is also confirmed by the events that followed the collapse of the country. For example, in Russia, after the Democrats came to power and launched the market mechanism, hunger and shortages were eliminated in record time. By the end of 1991, the moment of the death of the USSR, there was a total shortage of everything in the country, almost all the few goods were issued on coupons. And a year after that, the very word "deficiency" practically disappeared from the lexicon of Russian citizens.
So, let me summarize. The Soviet Union, like any socialist society, was initially doomed to collapse, and all the actions of the Soviet leadership were due not to mythical evil intent, but to ignorance of the fundamentals of the economy and sincere naive faith in the power of socialism and the State Planning Commission. And I cannot but be afraid that the sad example of the USSR did not work for everyone, and many people around the world are still trying to build societies similar to the Soviet one, based on the same false socio-economic premises.".

Krupa Tatyana Albertovna, Candidate of Sociological Sciences, Associate Professor of the Department of National History and Archival Studies, Far Eastern Federal University, Vladivostok [email protected] Okhonko Olga Ivanovna, Candidate of Historical Sciences, Associate Professor of the Department of National History and Archival Studies, Far Eastern Federal University, Vladivostok

The collapse of the USSR in the context of random and regular factors

Abstract.The article deals with random and natural factors collapse of the USSR. The role and place of the United States in the destruction of the USSR is assessed. The impact of internal political factors on the collapse of the USSR is analyzed. A complex of internal and external political consequences of the collapse of the USSR is given. Key words: internal political, foreign political, natural, perestroika, coup, collapse, union agreement, accidental, USSR, factors.

Appeal to this topic is due to memorable dates: 90 years since the formation of the USSR and 21 years since its collapse. The collapse of a huge state that existed on the territory of Europe and Asia had a lot of obvious and hidden reasons, as well as a complex of negative consequences. The purpose of this article is an attempt to understand the domestic and foreign factors of the collapse of the USSR, to determine whether these factors were natural or accidental. In theoretical terms, the problem remains not fully understood. The absence of archival materials, the presence of closed sources causes ambiguity and understatement, the discrepancy in the assessments of this catastrophe raises many questions. When studying this problem, the points of view of not only Russian historians and politicians were analyzed, but also the positions of foreign leaders who had a direct influence on current events. The content of this article analyzes a book called "WorldTransformed", its authors are J. Bush (senior) and his security adviser B Scowcroft. The book provides answers to important questions in the history of modern times - how the conditions were created for the collapse of the USSR and the Warsaw Pact, which led to serious consequences in the balance of power in the world. From a number of factors that influenced the collapse of the USSR, the role of the United States, which understood the real threat contained in the military potential, cannot be excluded Soviet Union. This is confirmed by the facts reflected in the aforementioned book, written in 1998. It evaluates the role and place of George W. Bush in the history of the United States and in world history. It is emphasized that the George W. Bush administration achieved the national goal, which many Americans aspired to achieve - this is the liberation of Eastern Europe and the destruction of the deadly threat to the United States. The USSR, having a huge stockpile of nuclear missile weapons, theoretically posed a threat to the military-political structures of the United States. The perestroika started in the Soviet Union and M. Gobachev's new foreign policy course suited the United States. M. Gorbachev's reforms made it possible to strengthen the position of the United States in Eastern Europe. G. Bush and B. Scowcroft note that, having embarked on perestroika, "Gorbachev set in motion forces whose consequences were unpredictable - they were unknown even to himself." In many ways, the United States was unexpected by M. Gorbachev's numerous concessions in relations with the countries of the former "socialist camp" that were members of the Warsaw Pact. In this book, George Bush writes that “Gorbachev does not understand the real situation that has developed in Eastern Europe. It looks like he was trying to cultivate "little Gorbachevs" who would win public support." Obviously, he hoped for a multiplier effect from perestroika, which would be extended to all the countries of Eastern Europe. However, the process of the collapse of the ATS was irreversible, the American plans to blow up the ATS from the inside were implemented, thereby, according to the United States, an end was put to the split of Europe. the process of collapse, did not delay, but on the contrary, accelerated it. Analyzing their impression of the collapse of the communist regimes in Europe, the authors of the book exclaim: “Even in their dreams they could not dream that during their lives they would see this: Europe is united and free.” The loss of control over Eastern Europe had a huge negative consequence for the Soviet Union. In particular, the GDR was a “prize” for the USSR after the end of World War II, a reliable military ally and an important economic partner. The loss of the GDR meant the recognition of the end of Soviet domination in Eastern Europe. Gorbachev's foreign policy position caused a negative reaction among Soviet politicians, military men, diplomats and in the general public of the USSR. Gorbachev gave up one position after another. He made concessions to American pressure in many foreign policy issues, and this was disastrous for the USSR. For many years, throughout the “ cold war»In the United States, plans were developed to destroy the Soviet Union. Huge amounts of money were spent for this purpose, nuclear arsenals were created, radio stations were financed on the territory of third countries, and so on. When perestroika and glasnost began, the USSR became more open to the world. In the conditions of aggravated economic difficulties and changes that made it possible to talk about everything aloud, it would be strange if the United States suddenly abruptly abandoned the idea of ​​\u200b\u200bdisintegrating the USSR and did not begin to use the opportunities that opened up before them. It turns out that the United States was better in control of the situation in the USSR than in the Union itself. Unfortunately, Gorbachev largely did not understand the seriousness of the danger that threatened the Soviet Union. By 1991, an internal political crisis was rapidly developing in Moscow. The American side was informed about the impending putsch of the State Emergency Committee. US Ambassador to the USSR J. Matlock was informed about the forthcoming putsch by Moscow Mayor G. Kh. Popov. US politicians in their memoirs of the collapse of the USSR note that the American side immediately informed M. Gorbachev and B. Yeltsin about the impending putsch. emergency and the history books say so. In this context, it becomes clear why Gorbachev declared that he would never tell the whole truth about the August events.

When the State Emergency Committee arose on August 19, 1991, George W. Bush was the first of the leaders of the Western states to support Yeltsin. As Gorbachev's real power diminished, the attitude of the US president towards the two rival leaders towards Yeltsin gradually changed. The Americans had a good opportunity to observe from the outside the internal political struggle in the USSR, especially since B. Yeltsin kept George W. Bush informed of all the details related to the GKChP. On August 21, B. Yeltsin had a conversation with George W. Bush, in which he congratulated the US President on the fact that in our country "Democracy has won the greatest victory, thank you very much for providing us with colossal assistance." This act of B. Yeltsin can be regarded as a betrayal of the Soviet Union. Even George Bush refused to comment on what had been done. B. Yeltsin was waiting for congratulations, and George Bush simply replied that he understood him and felt "a little embarrassed" at the same time. B. Yeltsin was sure that at present the country was freed from "the global center that commanded us for more than seventy years." He launched a frontal attack on the USSR and openly "pulled the Union brick by brick in order to then transfer most of the rights of the Union to Russia." Much of what has been analyzed suggests that in the current crisis situation in the USSR on the eve of collapse (economic crisis, political, party, etc.), this process was artificially initiated both from within and from without. It is impossible to exclude the influence of the information factor on the collapse of the USSR. Glasnost, as a structural element of perestroika, played its decisive role; it consisted in weakening censorship and removing the numerous information barriers that existed in Soviet society. The people were in a state of shock for a long time, dumbfounded, it was difficult to understand "who is who." All information means were used, because glasnost, democratization swept the USSR, everyone reveled in it, not understanding what was really happening. Discussions began about the horrors of the Soviet system; they were aimed primarily at the ideological destruction of the foundations of Soviet society, the press was inundated with negative information, where the image of a terrible homeland and a wonderful foreign country clearly loomed. system and the Soviet Union in general. Such an identical direction of action of various factors could only be explained by leadership from a single center. In other words, an information attack was carried out on our country, and it gave its devastating results. Signs of ideological collapse began to appear throughout the country. The leadership of the USSR did not take effective measures to stop this destructive process, it was split. The actions of M. Gorbachev and B. Yeltsin are characterized by many researchers as a policy of “purposeful inaction.” On the eve of the collapse of the USSR, tension was growing in the Union republics. The positions of M. Gorbachev and B. Yeltsin on the question of the fate of the republics were completely different. M. Gorbachev was a supporter of a gradual transition to their independence. B. Yeltsin spoke about the right of the union republics to secede from the USSR, as a result of which it can be concluded that he “hit the backbone of the Soviet state, shaking it to the ground political structure". When the declarations of the union republics on sovereignty were adopted in 1991, the question was raised about the continued existence of the Soviet Union and its transformation into a democratic federal state. In the same year, a resolution "On the general concept of the union treaty and the procedure for its conclusion" was adopted. But at the beginning of the preparation of a new union treaty, the extreme aggravation of relations between the leadership of the USSR and Russia played its role. Doctor of Historical Sciences Z.A. Stankevich emphasized that by the spring of 1990, “the trend towards “chaotic decentralization of economic, political and socio-cultural life in the USSR” intensified.” It became obvious that a radical renewal of the Union was needed on the basis of a new union treaty. At the fifth (last) Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR, it was proposed to prepare an agreement on the Union of Sovereign States, in which each of the republics "will independently determine the form of its participation in the Union." On November 6, 1991, the President of the USSR sent to the State Council a draft Treaty on the Union of Sovereign States (USS), a union democratic state exercising state power. Until December 1991, the agonizing process of saving the Union in any form continued, but the situation became more and more uncontrollable every day.

Ukraine defiantly stepped aside even from participating in the preliminary discussion of the union treaty. In mid-November, only 7 participants remained at the negotiating table in NovoOgarevo: Russia, Belarus and five Central Asian republics. On December 1, in a referendum in Ukraine, 90.3% of the participants voted for its independence. The United States immediately declared its readiness to establish diplomatic relations with it, and B. Yeltsin was the first to recognize the independence of Ukraine. Thus, the Union Treaty, not having time to be born, died. Events were coming to an end. The USSR locomotive approached the crash site in the little-known Belarusian village of Vaskuli, in the wilds of Belovezhskaya Pushcha, where back in the time of N. Khrushchev a hunting lodge was built for the rest of former party officials: it was easier to keep your plans secret here. The main characters B. Yeltsin, L. Kravchuk, S. Shushkevich were in fear. They understood that their actions were not entirely legal and even criminal to some extent. On December 25, 1991, M. Gorbachev made a statement on television: “Due to the current situation with the formation of the Commonwealth of Independent States, I cease my activities as President of the USSR.” At 19:38 on December 25, 1991, the red flag of the USSR was replaced over the Kremlin tricolor Russian. Of course, one can assume that the Soviet Union has outlived its usefulness, and Gorbachev became a brake on the path of reforms, but in this situation it would be legal at the negotiating table to all the leaders of the republics to officially declare the abolition of the treaty on the creation of the USSR of December 30, 1922. The Belovezhskaya Treaty was illegal and criminal, because three people did not have legal authority to decide the fate of an entire state.

To ratify the Belovezhskaya agreement, it was necessary to convene the highest body of state power - the Congress of People's Deputies of the RSFSR, since the agreement affected state structure Republic and entailed changes in the constitution. In April 1992, the 5th Congress of People's Deputies refused to ratify the agreement three times and to exclude references to the constitution and laws of the USSR from the text of the constitution of the RSFSR, which would later become one of the reasons for the confrontation between the Congress of People's Deputies and President Yeltsin, which would later lead to the tragic events of October 1993. Thus, Despite the fact that de facto the USSR ceased to exist, the Constitution of the USSR of 1977 de jure continued to operate on the territory of Russia until December 25, 1993, when the Constitution of the Russian Federation adopted by popular vote came into force, which did not contain a mention of the Constitution and laws of the USSR. After 21 a year after the collapse of the USSR, Komsomolskaya Pravda published an interview with former Belarusian Foreign Minister Pyotr Kravchenko under the heading “It’s not true that the document on the CIS was waved without looking by the half-drunk B. Yeltsin, L. Kravchuk and S. Shushkevich.” He claims that the document was based on the Russian-Ukrainian and Belarusian-Russian agreements on friendship and cooperation of 1990, i.e. “We made a multilateral document out of bilateral documents, which made it possible to create the Commonwealth of Independent States.” Disputes over the assessment of the significance of the Belovezhskaya Agreement continue to this day. The Belovezhskaya agreement became one of the episodes of the accusation against B. Yeltsin. The Special Commission of the State Duma stated that B. Yeltsin, by signing the Belovezhskaya Agreement, went on a gross violation of Articles 7476 of the Constitution of the USSR and committed these actions contrary to the will of the peoples of the RSFSR on the need to preserve the USSR, expressed during the popular vote (referendum) held on March 17, 1991. The commission also accused B. Yeltsin of treason by preparing and organizing a conspiracy to unconstitutionally seize the union power, abolish the union institutions of power that were then in force, and unlawfully change the constitutional status of the RSFSR. In search of an answer to the question: “was the collapse of the USSR the result of objective processes or the result of the destructive actions of specific historical persons and forces?”, One should proceed only from an analysis of the specific facts and circumstances of that time. And the most important argument in this dispute should be the position of the peoples of the USSR, it is the people who are the bearer of sovereignty, the will of the people is the highest power in the country. But this did not play a decisive role, although it should be taken into account that the referendum on the preservation of the USSR was held belatedly. And the main thing, in our opinion, was that the will of the people did not correspond to the personal interests of the group of politicians of that time headed by B. Yeltsin. They were not even stopped by the fact that these separatist actions were contrary to the Constitution and were not approved by the Congress of People's Deputies of the RSFSR, the highest body of state power. The RSFSR did not have legal force in the part related to the termination of the existence of the USSR. After the end of the Great Patriotic War The USSR did not know major upheavals, but in the 1990s of the twentieth century, it experienced events that, in terms of their consequences for the population, can be compared with a real war. So thinks the current President V. Putin. Huge territories were lost, the population decreased, industry fell into decay, devastation reigned for many years. Summing up, it should be noted that it is too early to draw any deep conclusions in the problems of the collapse of the USSR, the laws or accidents of this fact. Many questions remain unclear to this day. We need archival materials, documents of that period and their truthful, objective interpretation. Our convictions do not rule out serious economic, political, ideological and many other factors that have undermined the might of a great power. But at the same time, we believe that the collapse of the USSR is the result of gross miscalculations and mistakes of politicians, the actions of destructive centrifugal forces that made Belovezhskaya Pushcha a symbol of irresponsibility and voluntarism in politics. Russian Federation - B. Yeltsin, who in 1996 stated that he regretted signing the Belovezhskaya Agreement. M. Gorbachev also admitted his miscalculations, but no one has yet told the whole truth about what he had done. A historical analysis of previous eras shows that our country the period of more than a thousand years of history faced the threat of collapse during the period of feudal fragmentation in the 13th century, and during the Time of Troubles in the 17th century, and during the years of great social upheavals in 1917-1922. External and internal enemies tried to destroy the state through non-recognition, blockade, famine, destructive wars. They did not succeed, because there were always forces within the state that opposed this threat. The greatness of Russia at all times relied on the spiritual potential of the nation.

V. Putin called the collapse of the USSR the biggest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century. And he emphasized that in order to survive in an era of upheaval, it is precisely “spiritual bonds”, the unity of the people, that are needed. In general, one can note the domestic and foreign policy consequences of the collapse of the USSR. states in place of the former USSR.Among the internal political factors can be divided into three groups: territorial, demographic, economic, internal political and social. Territorial factors include a decrease in the territory of the Russian Federation compared to the territory of the USSR by 24% (from 22.4 to 17 million km²), while the territory of Russia has practically not changed compared to the territory of the RSFSR. Demographic factors include a 49% decrease in population (from 290 to 148 million people). Streams of refugees and internally displaced persons were formed, not only the Russian-speaking population of the republics of the former USSR, but also many other ethnic groups of the vast collapsed country, the regions of their exit: Central Asia, the Caucasus, the North Caucasus. Economic factors include: the collapse of the ruble zone, the decline in production, the depreciation of the ruble, destruction of economic relationships between enterprises. To political factors include: the cessation of the existence of unified Armed Forces USSR, there was a massive reduction in the military. The termination of the legal powers of the USSR and the lack of a legislative framework in the newly created Russian Federation led to a "war of laws", which resulted in the tragic events of October 1993. There were significant changes in social structure Soviet society. New social strata appeared, including “poor working people”, the homeless, the homeless and many others who were unable to adapt and adapt to other living conditions within the new state. There was a deep stratification of society, at one extreme - oligarchs, officials, entrepreneurs of high rank; on the other, low-income and needy citizens of Russia. Was the collapse of the USSR a historical inevitability, a coincidence, or a betrayal of the leading Soviet politicians headed by M. Gorbachev, B. Yeltsin? Questions that are usually classified as debatable problems of history. In any case, it is too early to put an end to this issue, especially considering the terrible consequences of the collapse of the USSR.

1.Bush G., Scowcroft B.A. World Transformed. NewYork–Toronto, 1998.590 p. Cit. by: Ivanov R.F. The collapse of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union. American version // Historiography and source studies. 2000. No. 5.С.167174.2. Ivanov R.F. The collapse of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union. American version // Historiography and source studies. 2000. No. 5. С. Domestic history for humanitarian universities. M., 2008.345 p. 5. Reports of the US Ambassador to Moscow J. Matlock // Modern and Contemporary History. 1996. No. 1. С. Historical and legal aspects of the collapse of the USSR: Abstract of the dissertation for the competition degree doctor of legal sciences. M., 2002.52 p. 7. Alekseev V.V., Nefedov S.A. The death of the Soviet Union in the context of the history of socialism // Social sciences and modernity. 2002. No. 6.С.6687.8. Zlatopolsky D.L. The destruction of the USSR: reflection on the problem. M., 1992.291 p. 9. Shakhnovich T. Ex-Minister of Foreign Affairs of Belarus Petr Kravchenko: “It’s not true that the document on the CIS was waved without looking by half-drunk Yeltsin, Kravchuk and Shushkevich ...” // Komsomolskaya Pravda, December 8, 2012 No. 185.C.8.10. Isakov V.B. Dismemberment: who and how destroyed the Soviet Union: a chronicle. Documents. M., 1998.344 p. 11. Kostikov V. Confused generation // Arguments and facts. No. 49.2012. P. 6.12. Yasin E. G. Who ruined our beautiful Union? // Knowledge is Power. 2001. No. 4.С.7687.

Krupa Tatiana, PhD in sociology, assistant professor of Far Eastern Federal University, Vladivostok [email protected] Okhonko Olga, PhD in history, assistant professor of Far Eastern Federal University, Vladivostok Disintegration USSR in context casual and natural factors.Abstract. In article are considered casual and natural factors of the disintegration of the USSR. The role and place USA are Valued in destruction USSR. The influence of the domestic political factor is analyzed on the decay of the USSR. Happens to the complex inwardly and outward politicalconsequence wreckages USSR.Keywords: inside political,outward political, natural, realignment, putsch, disintegration, union agreement, casual, USSR, factors.