The USSR: A Lesson From History

From the report of the 10th of November
This week marks an interesting week in history as it commemorates the fall of the Soviet Union with the destruction of the Berlin Wall on the evening of November 9th 1989. The event spelled the end of USSR by broadcasting to the world that it was losing control. Checkpoints were suddenly opened and regulations were relaxed mainly because the massive amount of Germans passing from East to West Berlin could not be controlled by the Soviet authorities. It marked the end of the long history of Cold War strife with the USSR.
It is easy to conclude that it was under the leadership of President Ronald Reagan that the Soviet Union collapsed. His words at the Berlin wall in 1987 have always been memorable and inspiring to many. There is however, an important lesson for us today in the events of the late 80s. That lesson is that no matter how good a communicator President Ronald Reagan was, the fall of the USSR would not have been brought about without the willingness on the part of the Soviet leadership. It was the reform movement lead by Mikhail Gorbachev within the Kremlin that paved the way to the USSR’s demise. Reagan’s words would have been just what they were, words, if it had not been that willingness for change. It’s an important lesson in history that is worth remembering today. Without willingness from within, dictatorships are generally not successfully converted to constitutional republics. That’s what Gorbachev showed in the late 80s. Since the end of the Second World War the Soviets had posed a threat and were “dealt with” by every president since Harry S. Truman. It was however only until the leadership made up its mind to push for change and undo the decades old policies put in place by Lenin that the real change was brought about.
It is most important for us to understand today in dealing with the MiddleEast that the best efforts towards reform come from a nation’s civilian leadership. Foreign nations slapping sanctions on “unruly” dictatorships, or invading them and toppling their governments has never worked and it never will. No matter where they stand on the invasion of Iraq in 2002, generally people acknowledge how much easier would have been in there had been a movement within Iraq to take down Saddam Hussein.
As we look back on the Cold War era, we should not forget some of the lessons that dealing with the Soviets taught us. We can look back and celebrate the demise of a dictatorship that imprisoned its people in gulags, but if we don’t remember some of the era’s important lessons it does our generation no good to remember.