New Stage In Collapse Of Empire

33 years ago the USSR seemed indestructible.

The empire seemed strong, with a powerful nuclear arsenal and half the world's countries as satellites. Five months before that, a referendum had been held in which the overwhelming majority of citizens voted in favour of preserving the USSR. The CIA noted in its reports that the Soviet Union was indestructible and its leadership was determined and capable of overcoming all current problems.

Five days later, Ukraine declared independence.

Four months later, the Soviet Union ceased to exist as a political entity and geopolitical reality. Its flag over the Kremlin was brought down and its president resigned.

When analysing the reasons for the collapse of the USSR, some people point to subjective factors like Gorbachev, Kravchuk or Yeltsin. Yet one man or even three men cannot bring down a mighty empire, if it is indeed mighty. Obviously, there are objective reasons: economic problems, managerial problems, military failures, environmental disasters, the fall of ideology, the rise of identities, etc.

Then the empire survived primarily because of the West's unwillingness to allow its complete collapse. The West saved the Russian empire three times in the twentieth century, claims Slovak researcher Juraj Mesik. The national (then autonomous) republics proclaimed sovereignty, two of them declared independence, but the Russian Federation started the Chechen War, and the West sided with the empire, while all attempts of independence were stifled by force, threats, and bribery of elites.

Now we have the next stage of the collapse of the empire, hopefully the last one. Add to the factors of disintegration what was not there in 1991: a debilitating war, sanctions, conflict with the West, demographic problems, the presence of the Internet, the position of strong players like China and Turkey, the presence of success stories of nations liberated in 1991.

The process of breaking the empire is slow but inevitable.

Valery Pekar, Facebook

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