Russia Depth Study 5

Question 1

When did Gorbachev lead the Soviet Union from and until?

Answer 1

1985-1991

Question 2

Perestroika means..?

Answer 2

Restructuring how a country is run, politically and economically.

Question 3

Glasnost means?

Answer 3

Transparency

Question 4

Why did the USSR invade Afghanistan in 1979?

Answer 4

Iran had had a revolution and was being run by extremist right wing leaders. The USSR did not want Afghanistan to follow the same route.
Afghanistan was also a helpful buffer zone between Iran and the USSR
They did not like the leader that was in charge of Afghanistan as he appeared to be working closely with the USA.

Question 5

The USA funded rebel groups to fight against Communism in Afghanistan. The main group they funded were called the M_________

Answer 5

Mujahideen

Question 6

Gorbachev rejected the Brezhnev Doctrine replacing it with the S_____ Doctrine

Answer 6

Sinatra Doctrine

Question 7

The Sinatra Doctrine said that…

Answer 7

Satellite states within the Warsaw Pact would not be invaded by Soviet tanks to deal with their own internal political troubles, but their own governments would be left to deal with problems alone.

Question 8

The Afghanistan war ended up lasting for how many years?

Answer 8

10

Question 9

Describe some consequences of the Afghanistan invasion in 1979.

Answer 9

The SALT talks between the USA and the USSR came to an end.
President Carter released the Carter Doctrine.
Detente ended between the USA and the USSR.
The USA boycotted the Moscow Olympics.
Ronald Reagan won a huge election victory in 1980 promising to be tough on Communism.

Question 10

What was the SDI ‘Star Wars’ programme and which president started it?

Answer 10

An idea to use lasers from satellites in space to shoot down nuclear missiles inbound for the USA.
President Reagan.

Question 11

Describe some of the internal consequences of the Afghan war on the USSR.

Answer 11

The military felt Gorbachev had betrayed them. They formed the Afgantsy.
The economy stagnated
Encouraged the republics in the USSR and the satellite states to make nationalistic moves as the USSR military seemed too weak to hold onto them by force.

Question 12

Give some evidence that the economy stagnated during the 1980s.

Answer 12

Oil prices dropped by 2/3s
Command economy was inefficient and totally uncoordinated.
Non-existent consumer goods industry
There was little incentive to work
The gap between east and west living standards grew wider.

Question 13

What had the government been telling the people had been happening to the economy?

Answer 13

They said that the Soviet economy had multiplied more than 80 times when in fact the real number was about 6 times.
Khrushchev had promised a fully communist utopia would exist within 20 years of 1961. This was not the case.

Question 14

What evidence do we have the alcohol was a problem in the USSR?

Answer 14

• sobering up stations all over the cities
• couldn’t be fired for turning up to work drunk
• in 1979 around 16-18 million people used the sobering up stations.
• Pravda blamed alcohol for the fact that industrial sites lay empty.

Question 15

How did Gorbachev try to fix the Alcohol problem?

Answer 15

He tripled the price of vodka.
He ordered that anyone out on the streets be challenged about why they were not at work.
Sadly, his heavy handed tactics only bred resentment and the Black Market flourished whilst government revenue fell dramatically.

Question 16

What happened at Chernobyl?

Answer 16

One of the reactors at the nuclear power station exploded. High levels of radiation spread for miles.
Firefighters gave up their lives trying to deal with the situation but really were just being sent to their deaths.
Chernobyl is an example of the inefficiency of the economic system as well as the leadership of the country.

Question 17

The satellite states and the republics at this time saw a rise in…

Answer 17

Nationalism and calls for independence.

Question 18

Describe Gorbachev’s personality and background

Answer 18

A great reformer who wanted to maintain communism but a reformed version of it.
Personable as he got on well with the western media and leaders
Many within the USSR saw him as a disastrous leader more interested in trips abroad whilst their country was falling apart.
A younger man than previous leaders. He was an end to the gerontocracy that had existed before him. A shift away from the generation who participated in and held in high regard the 1917 revolution.
Rose through the party being loyal from a young age.

Question 19

Uskorenie means…

Answer 19

Acceleration. In this context accelerating growth in the economy.

Question 20

Gerontocracy means

Answer 20

A form of oligarchical rule or ‘rule by the few’

Question 21

What were Gorbachev’s big ideas?

Answer 21

Rejecting the Brezhnev Doctrine
Democratisation
Glasnost
Perestroika
Uskorenie
Anti-Alcohol Campaign

Question 22

How did the fall in vodka sales impact government revenue?

Answer 22

17% loss of revenue in 1985.

Budget shortfall of 10 billion roubles.

Question 23

How did Gorbachev treat dissidents?

Answer 23

As part of glasnost he brought many exiled dissidents home, even giving them political positions e.g. Sakharov.

Question 24

What other evidence is there that Gorbachev genuinely acted out glasnost and that it wasn’t just a policy.

Answer 24

He spoke on USSR television unscripted.
He gave live interviews on western TV channels
He gave an interview to the Time USA magazine
He encourage the party to look further into the crimes of the past e.g Stalin’s actions, as he hoped this would encourage people that change was a good thing.

Question 25

Gorbachev’s initial attempts to boost the economy and introduce perestroika and glasnost alienated who?

Answer 25

The top ministers in the Politburo. They sought to get rid of him!

Question 26

How did Gorbachev overcome the problem of politburo ministers not supporting his ideas?

Answer 26

He appointed his friends into key positions and people that he knew believed in perestroika.

He also used the Matthias Rust incident to replace a lot of the military leaders in the USSR.

Question 27

Who was Ligachev?

Answer 27

The Second secretary of the Communist Party appointed under Andropov. He came to lead the Communist party’s reactionary faction and he openly spoke out against perestroika.
Arguments between Ligachev and Gorbachev over future courses of action even delayed the 1986 Central Committee Plenum.

Question 28

What was the Law of State Enterprise in 1987?

Answer 28

This law allowed a limited amount of free enterprise. The goal was by allowing it efficiency would be increased. Factory managers gained more power in decision making.

Question 29

What was the Law on Co-operatives in 1988?

Answer 29

This law lifted the restrictions on private businesses, mainly in the service industries. The new co-operatives meant that all employees became co-owners. The socialist sound of this policy enabled Gorbachev to push it through easily.

Question 30

What administrative reforms did Gorbachev make?

Answer 30

More finances were allocated to the Soviets.
The number of departments in the Communist Party Central Committee were reduced from 20 to 6.
At the state level ministries were conglomerated into giant organisations to simplify planning.

Question 31

How much of an impact did Gorbachev’s administrative and economic reforms make?

Answer 31

The results were inconsistent and based on trial and error.
The entrepreneurial spirit did encourage many small businesses to open up e.g. small shops and cafes.
The economy remained sluggish though and panic buying set in as inflation continued to rise. (Inflation was at 10% by 1989)
In 1987 industrial production fell by 7%
This provoked the reactionary faction to call Gorbachev a destructive force within the USSR and a capitalist at heart. They wanted all of his reforms reversed and they could use the argument they weren’t working anyway!

Question 32

Who was Nina Andreeva?

Answer 32

She was a Leningrad Chemistry teacher who wrote a letter in March 1988 against Perestroika. It became very famous and was even called the anti-perestroika manifesto by those who opposed Gorbachev.

Question 33

Wh was Andreeva’s letter a serious challenge to Gorbachev?

Answer 33

It articulated the longing for security that many in the USSR wanted, particularly with regard to the economy. The letter represented that the popularity of the anti-perestroika feeling was growing and that his position as First Secretary could be called into question. The politburo put him in power, they could turn on him too, like they did to Khrushchev!

Question 34

How did Gorbachev reform the political structure of the USSR?

Answer 34

He made a new government body called the Congress of People’s deputies. This body held 2 250 seats. From within this new body, a supreme soviet would be elected of 542 seats. The Supreme Soviet would act like a national parliament. A president was also to be elected to oversee these new organisations but temporarily Gorbachev made himself President as well as First Secretary. Gorbachev’s aims with these changes was to strengthen the Communist Party by showing it was accountable.

Question 35

What happened to the Congress of People’s deputies almost immediately after it was set up?

Answer 35

It divided into two factions. Those who favoured reform and those who wanted Gorbachev out of power and his reforms reversed.

Question 36

The split within the Congress into pro and anti reformist groups mirrored what?

Answer 36

The attitudes with the USSR society as a whole.

Question 37

Sakharov had become a leading voice by the late 1980s calling for full democracy in the USSR. He died of a heart attack in 1989, how did he even in death cause problems for Gorbachev?

Answer 37

His funeral became a political rally with over 80 000 people attending and calling for full democracy. Gorbachev continued to support the need for reform and some democratisation but he in no way wanted to replace Communism.

Question 38

Why did Yeltsin dislike Gorbachev?

Answer 38

Yeltsin accused Gorbachev of setting up a cult of personality

Question 39

The rivalry between Yeltsin and Gorbachev was p______ as well as i________

Answer 39

personal as well as ideological

Question 40

Whilst out of the politburo what did Yeltsin do?

Answer 40

Forged links with other reformers like the Church in order to sure up his power base in Moscow.

Question 41

What was article 6 of the Soviet Constitution?

Answer 41

The article that gave the Communist Party a monopoly of power within the USSR to direct and control the apparatus of government.

Question 42

In February 1990 over 250 000 people demonstrated at the Kremlin calling for a repeal of article 6 of the Soviet Constitution. They carried placards saying what?

Answer 42

“73 years on the road to nowhere”

Question 43

In March 1990 Gorbachev caved in to demands and gave the USSR…

Answer 43

A multi party state with a US style president

Question 44

Gorbachev later in the year 1990 was forced to take a more conservative stance in an attempt to keep the divided party together. What did he refuse to do and what did he do?

Answer 44

He refused to split the Communist Party into two separate parties.
He appointed more reactionary politicians into the key positions of the politburo

Question 45

Whilst Gorbachev was struggling to keep the party together in late 1990, Yeltsin was?

Answer 45

Trying to establish himself as the leader of the Republic of Russia. The largest republic of the Soviet Union.

Question 46

Yeltsin set up a movement called?

Answer 46

The Democratic Russia Movement

Question 47

Yeltsin declared sovereignty for the Russia Republic when?

Answer 47

June 1990

Question 48

As Communist Party power unravelled from the top…

Answer 48

The Union of Republics was shattered from below

Question 49

By the end of 1989 all of these had left the USSR’s control and what had fallen?

Answer 49

The satellite states of Eastern Europe had all left the Soviet Union control and ceased to be communist and the Berlin Wall had fallen.

Question 50

Throughout 1989 and 1990 Gorbachev ordered what to try and keep the republics under control?

Answer 50

The KGB to use violence against them with the hope of actually stirring up more trouble allowing Gorbachev to thus issue a state of emergency.

Question 51

In August 1990 despite their mutual loathing, Gorbachev and Yeltsin got together to work on?

Answer 51

The resurrection of the USSR’s economy

Question 52

Gorbachev and Yeltsin’s economic plan in 1990 was called?

Answer 52

“500 days programme”

Question 53

Many people within the USSR turned on Gorbachev at the end of 1990 because?

Answer 53

The people of the USSR turned on Gorbachev accusing him of acting like a capitalist and destroying the union. Some went as far to say that he had been working for western powers as an agent!

Question 54

What did the military start to call for instead of Communist Party rule by the end of 1990?

Answer 54

A right wing military dictator like Hitler to Mussolini to take over the running of the country. (Sound like a Tsar much?)

Question 55

Gorbachev received what prize in 1990 and why was this ironic

Answer 55

The Nobel Peace Prize

He returned having won it to shouts of “murderer” for what was happening in the Soviet Republics.

Question 56

The April 9+1 Treaty made what happen?

Answer 56

Many of the powers held centrally by the party were transferred to the Soviet republics

Question 57

What happened in the attempted coup 1991?

Answer 57

Gorbachev was placed under house arrest
Yeltsin led demonstrators to the Russian Parliament.
The tank commanders in charge of maintaining the coup and supporting the hard liners instead got out of their tanks and supported Yeltsin.
After 4 days the coup was over and the leaders fled.

Question 58

What was the impact of the failed coup d’etat?

Answer 58

It destroyed an positive reputation the party had.
Yeltsin suspended the Communist Party in Russia.
Gorbachev returned to Moscow looking dishevelled and exhausted.

Question 59

After the failed coup, Gorbachev still continued to argue for…

Answer 59

Full Communist Party rule

Question 60

How did Yeltsin humiliate Gorbachev?

Answer 60

Called him to the Russian Parliament and humiliated him on live TV by showing him proof of the scale of the party support for the coup.

Question 61

In August 1991…

Answer 61

All 15 Soviet Republics declared that they were leaving the USSR.

Question 62

On 24th August 1991…

Answer 62

Gorbachev resigned as the Communist Party’s General Secretary

Question 63

On 25th December

Answer 63

The dissolution of the USSR was officially announced

Question 64

Historical arguments about what caused the fall of the USSR in 1991?

Answer 64

It was Gorbachev’s actions in trying to reform Communism he went too far.
It was the west’s influence on the satellite states who saw how poor their own living conditions were compared to the western countries.
It was Reagan’s actions in the West that made the USSR realise economically and industrially it was too far behind to catch up.
It was the actions of the hardliners in attempting a coup that failed and damaged the party’s reputation for good.
It was the actions of Yeltsin encouraging the division and sovereignty of each of the Soviet Republics just so he could declare himself the legitimate leader of one.

What do you think is the correct answer?