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Mikhail Gorbachev has died

(www.reuters.com)
970 points homarp | 1 comments | 30 Aug 22 20:37 UTC | HN request time: 0.228s | source
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lapcat ◴[30 Aug 22 21:07 UTC] No.32655071[source]▶
The United States didn't do enough to help Russia transition to democracy in the 1990s. There was no "Marshall Plan" after the Cold War like there was after World War II. This was a huge mistake, and we see the consequences now, with Russia having turned back toward totalitarianism and imperialism. Sadly, it seems that Gorbachev's efforts were mostly for naught. But it was courageous at the time to open up the Soviet Union to glasnost and perestroika.

Of course Yeltsin was a big part of the problem too.

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1. AndyMcConachie ◴[30 Aug 22 22:39 UTC] No.32656063[source]▶
The USA put Yeltsin into power with a coup. Then Yeltsin turned over the reins to Putin. To say that the USA "didn't do enough to help Russia transition to democracy in the 1990s" is incredibly ignorant. The USA had no interest in promoting democracy in 90's post-USSR.

Gorbachev was a fool who believed that the USA and the west would not rape his country. We'll never know how many former citizens of the USSR died because of 90's shock therapy.