Gorbachev and the End of the Cold War 1985–1991

The end of the Cold War was one of the most remarkable and unexpected events of the twentieth century. The Soviet Union — a nuclear superpower with the world's largest military — collapsed without a major war, an outcome almost no one predicted. The key question is: what caused the Cold War to end — was it Reagan's pressure, Gorbachev's reforms, structural economic failure, or popular movements in Eastern Europe?

Key Definition: Perestroika ("restructuring") and glasnost ("openness") were the twin reform policies introduced by Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev from 1985. Perestroika aimed to modernise the Soviet economy through limited market reforms; glasnost aimed to increase transparency and public debate. Together, they unleashed forces that Gorbachev could not control.

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Gorbachev's Rise to Power

Mikhail Gorbachev became General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union on 11 March 1985, following the deaths in quick succession of Brezhnev (1982), Andropov (1984), and Chernenko (1985). At 54, Gorbachev was a generation younger than his predecessors and represented a new approach.

The Soviet Crisis

Gorbachev inherited a system in profound crisis: