A History of Modern Europe - From the Renaissance to the Present

1208 Ch. 29 • Democracy and the Collapse of Communism

president of the “Russian Federation,” another sign of how quickly the
Soviet Union was changing. The Communists now had little support in
Russia, by far the Soviet Union’s largest republic. Gorbachev announced a
new Communist Party platform, which eliminated Marxism and Leninism
in favor of “humane and democratic socialism.” He then left for an August
vacation in Crimea.

Intransigent Communists were now firmly convinced that Gorbachev’s

policies threatened the existence of the Soviet Union. In August 1991,

hard-liners within the Communist Party, army, KGB, and some members of

Gorbachev’s own cabinet placed the Soviet leader under house arrest in his

Crimean residence in an attempted coup d’etat that looked more like a comic

opera. Setting up an “Emergency Committee,” the conspirators apparently

hoped that they could convince or force Gorbachev to use his prestige against

reform by declaring a state of emergency. Gorbachev agreed to do so, but only

if such a move were approved “constitutionally” by the Supreme Soviet. The

conspirators then publicly declared the president to be “incapacitated.”

In Moscow, Yeltsin stood on a tank outside the Russian Parliament and

encouraged resistance. The coup fell apart, its leaders having underesti­

mated the strength of both Yeltsin’s and Gorbachev’s popular support. The

Soviet army remained loyal to Gorbachev. Yeltsin mobilized people in

Moscow by calling for resistance and the restoration of Gorbachev as the

legitimate Soviet leader. This appeal to constitutionality revealed how

much had changed in a very short time.

In August, Gorbachev returned to Moscow a hero, and again took a

more reformist stance. Even as Gorbachev continued to defend the Com­

munist Party before the Supreme Soviet, Yeltsin suspended the Communist

Party and its newspaper Pravda. These bold moves amounted to the dis­

mantling of communism in Russia.

The failed coup accelerated the collapse of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev

appointed new people to key ministries. Some KGB officers were pen­

sioned off, and television and radio were freed from the constraints of cen­

sorship. The Soviet government recognized the independence of the Baltic

republics, just months after Gorbachev had insisted on retaining the struc­

ture of the Soviet Union. In late August 1991, the Supreme Soviet voted to

put an end to the extraordinary powers previously accorded Gorbachev and

to suspend the Communist Party in the entire Soviet Union. Yeltsin

quickly moved to initiate a market economy in Russia.

One by one, the republics left the Soviet Union, where Russians had

constituted only about half of the population. Moldavia, Uzbekistan, and

Azerbaijan declared their independence. In December 1991, Ukraine fol­

lowed, after 90 percent of the population voted to leave the Soviet Union.

By the end of the year, thirteen of the fifteen Soviet republics had declared

their independence. The Soviet Empire was no more. Yeltsin and the pres­

idents of Belarus and Ukraine declared the Soviet Union dissolved. Gor­