Comments on: Why did the cold war really end?

By: Vaughn S K Nebeker

Vaughn S K Nebeker — Wed, 19 Apr 2017 18:25:20 +0000

becose casper winebuger US Secutary of defance ask Vaughn
Nebeker to put out Charanobyl. on a 99.999% win.
Vaughn Nebeker had sharanobyl out in 10 days beating the
Nuclear reactear 110 days. vaughn nebeker won the bet. It
was $220,000,000,000.00 Down at a trillion to one odds,
an the reactear did go out.

By: vaughn nebeker

vaughn nebeker — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 20:19:21 +0000

even thow I defeted russan tank 3,000 & tackic’s in egipt,serria in oct 1973/1974; chad 21 tanks in 1977,plus 8 russion t-90A-1’s in 1989’s in advanscan. I was ask to put out chernobyl reacter number 4#. I did not care what color creed or race thay were. only that thay were people who needed help. some time it hard to put downone eagio in helping a oponit of the cold war. anger and or war doe not salive problem’s people solve problems. list 25 years of life after cherobyl.
vaughn s k nebeker the scintest whos invetions put out chernobyl.

By: co-conspirator

co-conspirator — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 03:33:08 +0000

@Spiv
You are right of course. The dominoes started falling with the Round Table negotiations between Polish communist party and the opposition of KOR and Solidarity. It was the first time that a communist party gave up the power. And of course it would not happen if Gorbachev was not a different kind of a Soviet leader. One that was not willing to kill thousands for an idea compromised long before.

By: co-conspirator

co-conspirator — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 03:23:36 +0000

@mitchell porter : “Conspiratorial common sense”

What a beautiful oxymoron have you invented!!

By: mitchell porter

mitchell porter — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 04:24:45 +0000

Conspiratorial common sense tells me that Gorbachev and his allies engineered this event precisely so they had an excuse to sack their opponents in the military.

By: Oran Kelley

Oran Kelley — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 11:28:41 +0000

Actually got to study with a former military man who had made Russia his specialty in service & out–he spoke Russian, lived there for quite a while, had many Russian friends in all walks of life . . .

His take was that the system–the political system & the economic system–simply didn’t work well, and were generally perceived to not work well. The Soviet Union would have collapsed anyhow if it didn’t get more buy-in from the citizens of the Republics, and the only way to get that buy-in was through significant reform. This was known within the state for quite some time–Andropov was going to institute reforms of this nature, too.

Unfortunately, by the time they got around to doing it, reform became a trigger for dissolution, not a way of addressing it.

The ex-military guy had admiration for the moral suasion of Reagan & the Pope, but he didn’t give it a whole lot of credit: if the Soviet state & economy worked somewhat better, outside condemnation would have meant little.

By: DCBob

DCBob — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 14:26:21 +0000

I think Yaque #12 above is closest to an accurate explanation. As I understand it, Chernobyl pissed off a lot of mothers who realized the government/Party wasn’t going to take care of their children, and within a few weeks it became clear that they wanted an accounting and they weren’t going to go away. That episode led Gorbachev to strongly push for the ‘glasnost’ policy of substantially greater openness in government and especially in information flows. Gorbachev had long believed that Soviet Communism would work just fine if information could flow freely, and Chernobyl was his opening to push that new policy. Glasnost, in turn, resulted in the sudden availability of all manner of Western books, newspapers, and magazines suddenly becoming available to average people throughout the Soviet Union. That rush of information on conditions in the West revealed to average Soviet citizens something important that they for the most part really had not known: that they were indeed not nearly as well off materially as their counterparts in the West. That realization resulted in a rapid decline in the government/Party’s credibility and claim to power. The rest, as they say, is history.

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 12:37:36 +0000

Kevin, if you enjoyed that, you would enjoy A Perfect Spy as well! (Similar idea)

By: Greg Laden

Greg Laden — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 11:49:13 +0000

It’s funny that in all of these discussions, few ever mention Poland

I believe that you are correct in noting that Poland’s role is underestimated here.

By: Kapitano

Kapitano — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 11:42:42 +0000

You mean Gorbachev had nothing to do with it?

AKA the “some guy somehow got the power and decided to do it for some reason” theory of history.

No, the reasons were obviously economic. The whole point of a planned economy is to have a controlled and steerable economy – but under Stalinism planning was (a) incompetent and (b) still partly based on competition. Result: an unstable, unpredicatable and uncontrolled economy.

As for why planning was so incompetent and a kind of capitalism still present, that’s the complex question.

Hint: “Human nature” is not an answer.