Gorbachev Poll

[Akshay!]

What was Gorbachev's role in the collapse of USSR?

Was he incompetent, traitor, result of the material conditions, a & c, or all of the above?

Also, explain why?

Was he well-intentioned and failed or did he manage to accomplish exactly what he wanted?

[Bostana]

Gorbachev was never a communist. Every person on this site agrees with that Comrade. I think Ismail has something in his signature where Gorbachev even admits he wasn't a commie.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

A traitor to what, exactly?

[Comrade Alex]

The soviet union was Long due for collapse Gorbachev just dealt the final blow when he could have saved it now look at Russia
The mob an oligarchy prostitution and exploitation

[Akshay!]

Gorbachev was never a communist. Every person on this site agrees with that Comrade. I think Ismail has something in his signature where Gorbachev even admits he wasn't a commie.

So would the USSR have collapsed regardless of who the leader or was it something about Gorbachev as a person?


A traitor to what, exactly?

To USSR?


The soviet union was Long due for collapse Gorbachev just dealt the final blow when he could have saved it now look at Russia
The mob an oligarchy prostitution and exploitation

Why exactly did the USSR collapse? :confused:

[Old Bolshie]

He was incompetent because he tried to implement social-democracy in USSR and failed.

He was a traitor because he aimed to destroy the regime which he presided and did it.

He was a result of the material conditions because of the long period of stagnation of the soviet economy and its subsequent transformation in the late 80's/early 90's.

[Bostana]

Why exactly did the USSR collapse? :confused:

Spent all its money making weapons :grin:

Supposedly his goal from he start was to destroy the USSR.
http://www.revolutionarydemocracy.org/rdv6n1/gorbach.htm

[Crabbensmasher]

Ehh, incompetent bureaucracy, corruption, cronyism, political strife. The planned economy was riddled with inconsistencies, it was slow, and mostly geared towards large scale military production, therefore making it cumbersome and hard to improve. The free market perestroika reforms made the country perform even worse. Infrastructure was outdated, and unable to be renewed. People looked at the West in envy.
Basically, the economy was terribly disconnected from the people. It was controlled by a group of hard line technocrats, and any change to the system was shunned. Normal economic decisions were often overly-politicized, causing delays and stagnation of plans. Much needed projects were abandoned, or never came into fruition due to petty rivalries.
The economics were just background noise though; They set the stage for the collapse. I think the immediate reason for it was the political liberalization, or glasnost imposed by Gorbachev. That was the spark that ignited civil strife, quickly breaking apart the union.

Ol' Gorby made a wise decision though. With the Soviet Union out of the way, people can now learn what true communism is, instead of just associating it with USSR, which ended up as a stain in the name of the movement.

[Blake's Baby]

The soviet union was Long due for collapse Gorbachev just dealt the final blow when he could have saved it now look at Russia
The mob an oligarchy prostitution and exploitation

How could he have 'saved' it if it was 'due to collapse'? Is he like an evil Superman, who could have used his incredible powers to save something that was collapsing, but then, shockingly, didn't?



In answer to the OP, in my opinion he was the last of a corrupt bunch of politicians that tried to save the USSR but couldn't, not because he was incompetent, but because it wasn't possible to save the USSR.

He didn't introduce 'social democracy' because Russia was never anything other than a social democracy (an inefficient one, with a big military).

[blake 3:17]

Not going to vote in this one. I think he was reasonably well intentioned, trying to stop World War 3. Leave it at that.

[Old Bolshie]

He didn't introduce 'social democracy' because Russia was never anything other than a social democracy (an inefficient one, with a big military).

Gorbachev aim was to turn USSR into a social-democracy of western type which is very different from anything that ever existed in Russia.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

To USSR?

If by the USSR you mean the current state apparatus of the USSR at that time, then that's a fairly self answerable question. If there was that much opposition to Gorbachev within the bureaucracy, then he wouldn't have been able to put forward the plans he had in the first place.

A large majority of the 'USSR's decision makers were fully backing Gorbachev when he made the decisions he did. He didn't 'betray' anyone.

If by the 'USSR' you mean the soviet working class, then I'm sorry to tell you but those buggers have been betrayed since the late 1920s.

[Sudsy]

A Soviet Referendum said the majority wanted to keep the USSR together, except that didn`t seem bother Gorbachev as he brought it down.

[Ocean Seal]

A traitor to what, exactly?
To communism, Leninism, Stalinism, or revisionism depending on what you believe.

In any case he was a traitor because he didn't believe in the ideals of the SU, he was the product of material conditions (obvious reasons), and he was incompetent because his social democratic programs failed miserably and blew in his face resulting in Yeltsin.

[Geiseric]

How could he have 'saved' it if it was 'due to collapse'? Is he like an evil Superman, who could have used his incredible powers to save something that was collapsing, but then, shockingly, didn't?



In answer to the OP, in my opinion he was the last of a corrupt bunch of politicians that tried to save the USSR but couldn't, not because he was incompetent, but because it wasn't possible to save the USSR.

He didn't introduce 'social democracy' because Russia was never anything other than a social democracy (an inefficient one, with a big military).

Russia was not a social democracy. He and the bureaucrats leading from Stalin all had the idea in the back of their heads of becoming today's russian oligarchs. They haven't always had such dire poverty and wealth inequality as they do now, because everything used to be public property.

If it was simply a social democracy which was owned by the state, which is laughable, why wouldn't they just crush the working class like the Tsarists did instead of building it up and industrializing the country; if it they could just steal the farms from the Kulak farmers and never modernize? Can you explain to me why they had five year plans instead of simply keeping the economic mode of production exemplified by peasant farming being dominant?

[Geiseric]

To communism, Leninism, Stalinism, or revisionism depending on what you believe.

In any case he was a traitor because he didn't believe in the ideals of the SU, he was the product of material conditions (obvious reasons), and he was incompetent because his social democratic programs failed miserably and blew in his face resulting in Yeltsin.

He was a traitor to the now working class but a great friend to today's russian capitalists. Just like Stalin, there's no difference, they both played key roles in making possible the restoration of capitalism, including but not limited to murdering real communists.

[Chris]

Mikhail Gorbachev was a traitor to the working class, ensuring that the positive victories achieved throughout the USSR was buried alongside the state, and holds some personal responsibility for the state of Russia, and the world, today.

But in my opinion, one must not view the end of the USSR as solely 'Gorbachev tore it down!' he was a result of the material conditions the USSR was assailed by, and nothing more. To me, this does not excuse him from his crimes, but I doubt the USSR would have ended any differently if Mikhail Gorbachev had never been born.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

I want there to be "He was the first real Communist to run the USSR since Lenin died" ... not because i think that tho just because its fun to troll people, especially the doctrinaire "Marxist-Leninists"

[Lokomotive293]

Voted "All of the above" because the option "B&C" wasn't available. I don't think he was incompetent, as he knew exactly what he was doing. I do consider him a traitor, but to believe that one person alone could have caused the defeat of socialism in the USSR all by themselves would be quite immature and un-Marxist.

[Akshay!]

A lot of people here seem to be saying that even though he was a traitor, he was also the result of the material conditions. How are those two things compatible? I mean, if he was personally responsible, then someone else would've done something different, if he was a result of the material conditions then anybody would've done the same, but how can both be true?


He didn't introduce 'social democracy' because Russia was never anything other than a social democracy (an inefficient one, with a big military).

You mean even during Lenin?


Spent all its money making weapons :grin:

Supposedly his goal from he start was to destroy the USSR.
http://www.revolutionarydemocracy.org/rdv6n1/gorbach.htm

Why did these people make him the leader? I mean did everyone in his party also wanted to do the same thing or was it only him and a few other people? I ask this because I'm wondering whether things would have turned out differently if there was someone else other than Gorbachev...


I think he was reasonably well intentioned

Then why did he say "My ambition was to liquidate communism"??


Ol' Gorby made a wise decision though


"He was the first real Communist to run the USSR since Lenin died"

Wait, what? :confused:

[Astarte]

That quote from Gorbachev is dubious at best. Here is the source information:
This is from an interview by newspapers with Gorbachev in Ankara, Turkey where he was a guest at a seminar at the American University. It was published in the 'Dialog' newspaper in the Czech Republic. Courtesy: 'Northstar Compass', Toronto, February, 2000.

From an interview "by newspapers ... in Ankara". Oh. Newspapers in Ankara - which ones? Is the Czech newspaper simply referred to as "Dialog" referring to the periodical "Czech Dialogue"? How extremely vague and unclear this bibliographical information is... The actual article it is from reads more like Alex Jones conspiracy theoryism than anything actually historical... http://www.revolutionarydemocracy.org/rdv6n1/gorbach.htm

And here is a link to the Northstar Compass webpage ... so where on the webpage exactly can I find this earth shattering quote allegedly attributed to the guy who seemingly single handedly "brought down communism" by leading an Anti-Communist cabal of like-minded fellow conspirators in the upper most echelons of the CPSU ... http://www.northstarcompass.org/

Gorbachev has also been quoted by the NY Times as saying "''I am a Communist, a convinced Communist,'" http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/26/world/upheaval-east-gorbachev-enough-for-glasnost-though-he-set-liberalization-motion.html

[Old Bolshie]

A lot of people here seem to be saying that even though he was a traitor, he was also the result of the material conditions. How are those two things compatible?

They are. USSR material conditions led Gorbachev to think that the country needed a new political and economical course to overcome its internal problems. His solution was a social-democracy to replace the old regime. This qualifies him as a traitor to the regime he headed. What led him to be a traitor were USSR's material conditions.

Certainly that Gorbachev solution wasn't shared by everybody in the party and a hardliner leader would have followed a different path. If the USSR would have collapsed anyway it's hard to tell since the repression of the revolts would have been much more violent than it was. Remember how in China a much more resistant and violent repression allowed the regime to continue to this day.

[Akshay!]

That quote from Gorbachev is dubious at best. Here is the source information:

From an interview "by newspapers ... in Ankara". Oh. Newspapers in Ankara - which ones? Is the Czech newspaper simply referred to as "Dialog" referring to the periodical "Czech Dialogue"? How extremely vague and unclear this bibliographical information is... The actual article it is from reads more like Alex Jones conspiracy theoryism than anything actually historical... http://www.revolutionarydemocracy.org/rdv6n1/gorbach.htm

And here is a link to the Northstar Compass webpage ... so where on the webpage exactly can I find this earth shattering quote allegedly attributed to the guy who seemingly single handedly "brought down communism" by leading an Anti-Communist cabal of like-minded fellow conspirators in the upper most echelons of the CPSU ... http://www.northstarcompass.org/

Gorbachev has also been quoted by the NY Times as saying "''I am a Communist, a convinced Communist,'" http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/26/world/upheaval-east-gorbachev-enough-for-glasnost-though-he-set-liberalization-motion.html


That's weird... A communist doesn't need to say that he's a communist. Have you seen Bush or Reagan going around saying "I'm a Capitalist"? This just proves that he wasn't a communist, at least not in the late 80s and early 90s.

[Ismail]

Wow, Gorbachev said in 1989 that he was a communist while heading a "Communist" Party, how convincing. Reminds me of when Castro said a year before that people were "deluding themselves" in thinking that the USSR would allow a multi-party system.

This is what else Gorbachev said in December 1989: "And if we speak about the final goal, insofar as it is possible today to be definite, that is integration into the world community by peaceful means. By conviction I am close to social democracy." (Archie Brown, The Gorbachev Factor, p. 102.)

If you actually read Gorbachev and Soviet materials during the 1988-1991 period a term thrown around everywhere was "humane and democratic socialism," which coincided with attempts to find "common ground" between Marxism and Social-Democracy.

[Comrade Nasser]

I never really thought of Gorbachev as a communist.

[Lokomotive293]

A lot of people here seem to be saying that even though he was a traitor, he was also the result of the material conditions. How are those two things compatible? I mean, if he was personally responsible, then someone else would've done something different, if he was a result of the material conditions then anybody would've done the same, but how can both be true?

Hm, not if you see historical change as the result of an interaction between material conditions and individual factors.
To use the most prominent example, you can have awesome revolutionaries all you want, if you're not in a revolutionary situation, you will not have a revolution, and, at the same time, you can be in a revolutionary situation all you want, but if you don't have people that are capable of leading the revolution, it will most certainly fail.
I don't claim to know the causes of the defeat of socialism in the USSR, but I imagine it to be quite similar, an interaction between the material conditions (e.g. the pressure coming from Imperialist countries), and individual factors (mistakes made by the party or certain people in it, and the works of traitors like Gorbachev). So, material conditions made it possible for the Gorbachev line to take hold in the party, but that doesn't mean it had to be that way. It's not an either-or question.

[Astarte]

Wow, Gorbachev said in 1989 that he was a communist while heading a "Communist" Party, how convincing. Reminds me of when Castro said a year before that people were "deluding themselves" in thinking that the USSR would allow a multi-party system.

This is what else Gorbachev said in December 1989: "And if we speak about the final goal, insofar as it is possible today to be definite, that is integration into the world community by peaceful means. By conviction I am close to social democracy." (Archie Brown, The Gorbachev Factor, p. 102.)

If you actually read Gorbachev and Soviet materials during the 1988-1991 period a term thrown around everywhere was "humane and democratic socialism," which coincided with attempts to find "common ground" between Marxism and Social-Democracy.

My main point is not so much to defend Gorbachev, or even so much as to say he wasn't incompetent at all, but to point out that the sources that the "Liquidation of Communism" text give are completely dubious and unverifiable. As people who assume the nomenclature of "scientific socialists" I thought verifiable sources would be important - but if you guys want to get your facts by way of the same methods as Alex Jones conspiracy theorists, then by all means...

I have read a good amount of Gorbachev actually, I have the 27th Party Congress, "To Restore the Image of Socialism through Democratization" and "Using the Potential of Coopertives for Furthering Perestroika" sitting here in front of me actually, and it seems to me that while he was well intentioned, he had no clue of what he was doing, or the kind of social forces he was unleashing - in this way Gorbachev should be criticized or condemned, but not through ridiculous conspiracy theories which say he and a cabal actively decided to wreck the USSR.

[Ismail]

I have read a good amount of Gorbachev actually, I have the 27th Party Congress, "To Restore the Image of Socialism through Democratization" and "Using the Potential of Coopertives for Furthering Perestroika" sitting here in front of me actually, and it seems to me that while he was well intentioned, he had no clue of what he was doing, or the kind of social forces he was unleashing - in this way Gorbachev should be criticized or condemned, but not through ridiculous conspiracy theories which say he and a cabal actively decided to wreck the USSR.Using this logic you can defend just about anyone, from Khrushchev and Brezhnev to Deng, Alia, and so on just because they claimed they were "strengthening" socialism in some way. One winds up seeing demagogy and right-wing policies as some sort of naïve stumbling upon the restoration of capitalism (or in the Gorby and Dengist cases, the dismantling of any remaining working-class gains of their respective revolutions.) And it is precisely such a ridiculous view that allowed Castro to claim in 1992 that Gorbachev "struggled to perfect socialism," and a year later praise China and its leadership as "socialist," because apparently we can't judge what other "communists" do in confronting their own material conditions.

[Astarte]

Using this logic you can defend just about anyone, from Khrushchev and Brezhnev to Deng, Alia, and so on just because they claimed they were "strengthening" socialism in some way. One winds up seeing demagogy and right-wing policies as some sort of naïve stumbling upon the restoration of capitalism (or in the Gorby and Dengist cases, the dismantling of any remaining working-class gains of their respective revolutions.) And it is precisely such a ridiculous view that allowed Castro to claim in 1992 that Gorbachev "struggled to perfect socialism," and a year later praise China and its leadership as "socialist," because apparently we can't judge what other "communists" do in confronting their own material conditions.

Speaking of demagoguery, it is funny that you continue to try to say I am "defending" Gorbachev, especially after I mentioned I was not defending him. All I did was call the source of that quote out as completely unverifiable and urge Marxists to stop using Alex Jones methods of historiography. I think its important that we realize the USSR dissolved not because of a Gorbachev-led conspiracy like the "Liquidation" article suggests, but rather because social forces were unleashed by Perestroika and Glasnost which the CPSU simply could not control.

[Ismail]

I think its important that we realize the USSR dissolved not because of a Gorbachev-led conspiracy like the "Liquidation" article suggests, but rather because social forces were unleashed by Perestroika and Glasnost which the CPSU simply could not control.So what was Deng? Someone who sincerely believed in "developing the productive forces" in accordance with Marxism (note: he also claimed that any "distortions" in society and economics arising from his reforms could be countered by the party and state and thus keep China on the "socialist road") but who didn't realize the sheer weight of changes that would occur?

The fact is that everyone in Gorbachev's entourage either became open social-democrats (including Gorby himself) or firm anti-communists like Alexander Yakovlev and Dimitri Volkogonov. There were plenty of persons who still called themselves "Communists" after 1991, and practically all of them sided with the "hardliners" like Ligachev, not Gorby.

The fact is that Gorbachev's coterie included those elements which were not fully profiting from the state-capitalist system then in existence. Taking advantage of popular discontent and utilizing what prestige still remained in the CPSU among the people to "further socialism" through what was in reality a barely disguised market capitalism, they presided over the downfall of the USSR. Did they want the USSR (as a federal union) to fall? Most didn't, including Gorbachev who says as much in that speech you take issue with. Yet by 1991 Gorbachev's faction had to contend with a much stronger one: avowed neo-liberals under Yeltsin who appealed to Russian nationalism and adopted a "defiant" attitude vis-à-vis the CPSU, which rapidly lost any prestige and authority as a result of the rapid economic decline, the growth of bourgeois nationalism in the republics, and ideological schizophrenia brought on by Perestroika and Glasnost.

Edit: Also while we're on the subject, Gorbachev certainly did have plans to change Soviet society. As he recalled in a December 1990 speech: "Ten years ago, in the well-known situation of that time, [Shevardnadze] entered into opposition against certain forces. We knew this, and those who were close to him know all this very well. He, as well as I, working both at the local level and here, came to the conclusion that, even with the powers we had, we were unable to launch genuine processes of renewal. Life demanded that we go through all those ordeals and all those heated debates in order to come to the realization that we had to use the opportunity to begin changing everything in society." (quoted in Vernon V. Aspaturian, "Farewell to Soviet Foreign Policy," Problems of Communism, November 1991, pp. 54-55.)

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

This is kind of a silly debate. What does it mean to be a "Communist"? Christopher Hitchens was a "Communist" who became a major advocate for imperial intervention in Iraq later in his life. People aren't static - they have conflicting beliefs, they change over time, etc. What we can say is that certain actions he took were good or bad for the world, the proletarian revolution, etc. That seems like a more sensible debate.

[Akshay!]

Christopher Hitchens was a "Communist" who became a major advocate for imperial intervention in Iraq later in his life.

He's also considered to be an "atheist" by some LOL. :laugh:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86OK7IpoXDM


But anyway, the point is that intentions don't matter. Even if Gorby was thinking that he was a "communist" (although I seriously doubt that), his actions prove the contrary. In the real world, what matters is his actions (not his intentions, or thoughts, or whatever).

[Ismail]

It's worth noting that Hitchens still claimed to adhere to historical materialism. His attacks on "Stalinism" in, say, 1981 weren't much different from those in 2011. Unlike most Trots he grew up still maintaining a "Marxist" façade; he tried linking the American invasion with some supposed growth in Iraqi working-class consciousness and organization once they were "liberated" from Ba'athist "fascism."

That's worse than open anti-communists, and that's also why Gorbachev was such a shitty figure. He spoke at the 28th Congress of the CPSU in 1990 claiming that what collapsed in Eastern Europe was "Stalinism," he contrasted "humane and democratic socialism" with the so-called "administrative-command economy" said to have existed under Stalin and onwards, Soviet ideologues claimed they were "returning to Lenin" via reviving the works of Bukharin and studies of the NEP period, etc. It was little different from the efforts of the Eurocommunists beforehand who, under the cover of "rediscovering Marx" and "rescuing Marxism from Stalinism" and whatnot, justified their own right-wing politics.

Hitchens moved to the right based on his student Trotskyism, Gorbachev moved to the right based on Soviet revisionism. Both were able to take advantage of the opportunism of the existing ideology.

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

Using this logic you can defend just about anyone, from Khrushchev and Brezhnev to Deng, Alia, and so on just because they claimed they were "strengthening" socialism in some way. One winds up seeing demagogy and right-wing policies as some sort of naïve stumbling upon the restoration of capitalism (or in the Gorby and Dengist cases, the dismantling of any remaining working-class gains of their respective revolutions.) And it is precisely such a ridiculous view that allowed Castro to claim in 1992 that Gorbachev "struggled to perfect socialism," and a year later praise China and its leadership as "socialist," because apparently we can't judge what other "communists" do in confronting their own material conditions.

...Or as the result of the material conditions of underdeveloped peasant countries led by class-contradictory, bureaucratized communist parties, as the natural and historically proven outcome of third world socialism.

[Workers-Control-Over-Prod]

It's worth noting that Hitchens still claimed to adhere to historical materialism. His attacks on "Stalinism" in, say, 1981 weren't much different from those in 2011. Unlike most Trots he grew up still maintaining a "Marxist" façade; he tried linking the American invasion with some supposed growth in Iraqi working-class consciousness and organization once they were "liberated" from Ba'athist "fascism."

That's worse than open anti-communists, and that's also why Gorbachev was such a shitty figure. He spoke at the 28th Congress of the CPSU in 1990 claiming that what collapsed in Eastern Europe was "Stalinism," he contrasted "humane and democratic socialism" with the so-called "administrative-command economy" said to have existed under Stalin and onwards, Soviet ideologues claimed they were "returning to Lenin" via reviving the works of Bukharin and studies of the NEP period, etc. It was little different from the efforts of the Eurocommunists beforehand who, under the cover of "rediscovering Marx" and "rescuing Marxism from Stalinism" and whatnot, justified their own right-wing politics.

Hitchens moved to the right based on his student Trotskyism, Gorbachev moved to the right based on Soviet revisionism. Both were able to take advantage of the opportunism of the existing ideology.

Gorbachev, in contrast to other conscious left anti-communists, was an idiot, a sad human product of the directionless bureaucratic Soviet society who made his politics according to pressures from the surplus-suckers of Moscow and bourgeois propagandists from Washington; not according to any hard set individual intellectual convictions, or calculated political plans.
Certainly though, selfish socialist "state-capitalist" administrative forces existed that consciously had as their goal the privatization and destruction of the USSR, and these bourgeois-moralist (with help of USA, eventually anti-communist) forces buried within the USSR proved more robust within the Party and society than the Proletarian forces.

But we should ask ourselves: When the leader of a Communist Party is at best an idiot, at worst an anti-Marxist, where and how shall the class conscious elements of our class ever be able to continually lead the more backward members of our class?

[Luís Henrique]

Incompetent, obviously.

Traitor? But a traitor to what, exactly?

A result of the material conditions? Sure, who isn't?

So... A and C, and, consequently, D.

Luís Henrique

[Ismail]

Option C is akin to "he was the result of having blood and oxygen."

Gorbachev's rise to power, the lives and works of Karl Marx and Lyndon LaRouche, Hitler's anti-semitism, what I ate for breakfast, etc. are all provided for by the material conditions present at the time. What happens within these conditions is what matters, and within said conditions Gorbachev acted with exceptional incompetence and forwarded an exceptionally lame revision of Marxism before abandoning it in favor of social-democracy.

[canto-faire]

I'll be honest - I don't really see Gorbachev as all that incompetent. He successfully implemented Prestorika and Glasnost (the policies themselves failed, but the measure of a politician's competency is not whether their plans actually work). He successfully decentralized the Soviet Union. He successfully improved relations with the West. His only really disastrous failure in implementing policy seems to have been in trying to keep the Union together at all - something I doubt his heart was really in.

But I'm not specialist in Russian history - why do people claim he was so blatantly and obviously incompetent?

[Bronco]

I also don't see why Gorbachev should be universally considered so obviously and unfailingly incompetent. A lot of historians agree that he showed a remarkable tact and shrewdness in reassessing Soviet relations with the West and should be given principal credit for ending the Cold War and calling off the arms race. Obviously Marxists might not approve of his 'new thinking' but it was not the work of some blathering oaf. Nor can he be called a traitor really; a traitor to what exactly? Sure he sought to reform the Soviet system but who would say the USSR in 1988 was a system that was possible to maintain? In any case he did not come to power with the intention of destroying the Soviet Union, but where he failed was that he couldn't control the forces that his perestroika had unleashed, and certainly not within the same old constraints and framework of the USSR as he had initially thought possible.

[Ismail]

I also don't see why Gorbachev should be universally considered so obviously and unfailingly incompetent. A lot of historians agree that he showed a remarkable tact and shrewdness in reassessing Soviet relations with the West and should be given principal credit for ending the Cold War and calling off the arms race. Obviously Marxists might not approve of his 'new thinking' but it was not the work of some blathering oaf. Nor can he be called a traitor really; a traitor to what exactly? Sure he sought to reform the Soviet system but who would say the USSR in 1988 was a system that was possible to maintain? In any case he did not come to power with the intention of destroying the Soviet Union, but where he failed was that he couldn't control the forces that his perestroika had unleashed, and certainly not within the same old constraints and framework of the USSR as he had initially thought possible.For what it's worth people like Yegor Ligachev (and Andropov, of whom Gorbachev was a far more ambitious protégé) supported market reforms within limits and a very scaled down version of Glasnost related primarily to combating corruption. Plenty of Soviet figures criticized his foreign policy as well, for instance his "neutrality" (tacit approval) on the US invasion of Iraq and his patching up of ties with Israel.

People consider Gorbachev incompetent because the transformation of a competing superpower into an honorary member of the third world was largely attributable to the policies carried out under him and brought to their disastrous conclusion under Yeltsin.

[cyu]

http://rt.com/politics/brezhnev-stalin-gorbachev-soviet-638/

56 percent of respondents have positive feelings about Brezhnev. Experts link Brezhnev’s popularity among the population to financial well-being during his epoch, which was the “peak of Soviet socialism.”

Lenin, is seen in a good light by 55 percent of Russians

one-half of Russians favor Stalin. Stalin is associated with victory in World War II, which explains why he is favored by modern Russians.

Tsar Nicholas II, who was overthrown in 1917 got kind reviews from 48 percent of respondents.

Nikita Khruschev – who was Soviet premier during the Cuban missile crisis – is liked by 45 percent of Russians.

Yeltsin is viewed positively by only 22 percent of Russians. Attitudes towards Yeltsin worsened following his reforms which lead to inflation and the closure of many businesses.

Gorbachev is seen as Russia’s worst leader ever, and only one-fifth of the population has warm feelings about the Soviet president. Gorbachev’s rule ended up with the dissolution of the USSR, which is still considered by Russians as the 20th-century catastrophe

[Zealot]

All of the above. He was a traitor for betraying the Soviet people, he was incompetent because he didn't actually plan on the collapse of the USSR and his policies proved disastrous, but he was also a result of material conditions. Gorbachev wasn't a one-man show either; many within the CPSU were very supportive of Gorbachev as he seemed to be more level-headed at a time when Reaganism quite possibly could have pushed them into an unneeded War, particularly if a "hardliner" was in his place (of which there really weren't any by that time). Michael Parenti also claims that during his visit to the Soviet Union, shortly before its collapse, much of the intelligentsia were supportive of capitalism and were apparently shocked to hear from him that America had homeless people.

[TaylorS]

Gorby was simply the logical endpoint of the USSR's degeneration into an authoritarian State Capitalist regime. He decided to end the whole charade and convert the USSR into a bourgeois Social Democracy. Of course this unleashed the Neo-Liberal hounds who wanted their pound of flesh of the Soviet economy and hence the rise of Yeltsin, the dissolution of the USSR, and the sell-off of state industries at bargain prices.

[Red_Banner]

Gorby wasn't a traitor.

He just tried to fix things that long before he got into office needed fixing that spiraled out of control.

The "Gang of 8" were the real traitors.
Gorbachev had a treaty readyin August 1991 that was going to keep most of the Republics together.

But this "Gang of 8" illegally took power and held Gorby prisoner.

This scared off the Republics leaders from signing the treaty and fueled Boris Yeltsin's flames.

Blame the reactionary "Gang of 8" and Yeltsin.
Gorbachev doesn't have to take all of the burden of the blame.

[EdvardK]

I agree with Red Banner.
Also, what Gorbachev tried to fix was made "broken" decades ago (since Stalin).

[RedCeltic]

I think it is a bit naive to think that but one man could bring about the downfall of the Soviet Union. I think it was a series of bad policies over many decades. I myself, am not a fan of the USSR, though when I was in Saint Petersburg a few years ago I had spoken to several people who all seemed to be in agreement that they miss much of what they had under the old regime but had supported Gorbachev because they wanted the ability to travel and freely interact with the west.

[EdvardK]

I think it is a bit naive to think that but one man could bring about the downfall of the Soviet Union. I think it was a series of bad policies over many decades.
That's correct, and neglecting the development in the 2nd half of the 20th century, by sticking to the same (bureaucratic) principles that were dead long ago at that time.

[Red_Banner]

A lot of people here seem to be saying that even though he was a traitor, he was also the result of the material conditions. How are those two things compatible? I mean, if he was personally responsible, then someone else would've done something different, if he was a result of the material conditions then anybody would've done the same, but how can both be true?



You mean even during Lenin?



Why did these people make him the leader? I mean did everyone in his party also wanted to do the same thing or was it only him and a few other people? I ask this because I'm wondering whether things would have turned out differently if there was someone else other than Gorbachev...



Then why did he say "My ambition was to liquidate communism"??





Wait, what? :confused:

That site is garbage, not a credible source, and the only source.

[Stalinist Speaker]

Purge him!:rolleyes: (no hes to old and powerless)

[Onecom]

Well the way i see it people can say poor gorby tried to do what he could all they want.


He still managed to run a superpower into the ground.Thats why his grandkids and great grandkids live in mansions while loyal soviet workers had to sleep in dumpsters.:(

[Red Clydesider]

A little counterfactual history ('what if...' history) might actually help in our assessment of Gorbachev. If Brezhnev had not been allowed to linger on...and on, and Andropov had succeeded him even a few years earlier, the circle might have been squared - essential reforms might have been put in place in ways that would not have undermined the Soviet system.

Andropov paid attention to a problem that Gorbachev neglected: the 'second economy'. He was determined to put an end to this 'plundering of the people's property', and would have addressed this problem as a priority, along with or even before other reforms.

He set up a task force to recommend radical changes in the economic mechanism and planning system. These were not to include privatisation, but insisted on more workplace democracy within publicly-owned industry.

Those who were closest to Andropov, men such as Ligachev and Vorotnikov, were convinced that he knew the kind of reforms that would work, and understood the Soviet system, better than Gorbachev. Their opinions of Andropov are summed up by Keeran and Kenny:

'Unquestionably, Andropov understood the problems facing the Soviet Union and the CPSU and undertook serious reforms...Nothing in Andropov's words or deeds showed the slightest interest in the path Gorbachev would follow after 1987...Andropov distinguished himself, as his speeches between 1964 and 1983 show, by the creative application of Marxist-Leninist ideas to immediate problems, the bold defense of tough policies, and the ability to rebut Western criticism with strength and sophistication. In precisely those areas, where Gorbachev would exhibit the most vacillation, Andropov showed the greatest steadfastness.'

- Roger Keeran and Thomas Kenny, Socialism Betrayed (iUniverse, 2010).

Of course it's all 'what if...' but it seems a reasonable speculation. If Andropov's policies had been followed, the Soviet Union might have stood a better chance.

[Questionable]

Also, what Gorbachev tried to fix was made "broken" decades ago (since Stalin).Care to explain what Stalin broke that Gorbachev was apparently fixing?


He set up a task force to recommend radical changes in the economic mechanism and planning system. These were not to include privatisation, but insisted on more workplace democracy within publicly-owned industry.Reminds me of Titoite rhetoric. This "workplace democracy" means very little when public industries were already using profit as a measure of success. Democratic management of capital is not proletarian democracy.

All that excerpt illustrates is that Andropov was a hardline defender of Soviet social-imperialism while Gorbachev represented the more liberal wing.

[Ismail]

Andropov called for Soviet economists to study the economies of the "fraternal states" in Eastern Europe, i.e. the likes of IMF members Romania and Hungary, the likes of Poland with the vast majority of its countryside in private hands, etc.


Gorby wasn't a traitor.

He just tried to fix things that long before he got into office needed fixing that spiraled out of control.

The "Gang of 8" were the real traitors.
Gorbachev had a treaty readyin August 1991 that was going to keep most of the Republics together.

But this "Gang of 8" illegally took power and held Gorby prisoner.

This scared off the Republics leaders from signing the treaty and fueled Boris Yeltsin's flames.

Blame the reactionary "Gang of 8" and Yeltsin.
Gorbachev doesn't have to take all of the burden of the blame.I don't see what the Union Treaty has to do with anything. It would have removed one of the few "socialist" trappings and kept it an imperialist superpower rather than modern-day Russia as "merely" an imperialist entity today. I'm pretty sure that's not something communists should support.

A better program for Soviet workers, rather than tailing the Soviet bourgeoisie, was given by Hoxha in an open letter of sorts to them in 1979:

You must destroy the dictatorial fascist regime which is hidden behind deceptive slogans. You must know that those who are leading you are fascists, chauvinists and imperialists. They are preparing you as cannon fodder for a fierce imperialist war... The weapons and the army in the Soviet Union are no longer in the hands of the Soviet peoples and do not serve the liberation of the world proletariat... The Khrushchevite revisionists are seeking to arouse in you feelings of superiority and domination over others. They claim they are using your great strength allegedly to combat American imperialism and world capitalism, but this is false. Your rulers are in contradiction and alliance with American imperialism and world capitalism, not in the interests of the revolution, but because of their imperialist ambitions and greed for the division of spheres of influence and domination over the peoples...

The Brezhnevs, Kosygins, Ustinovs and Yakubovskys, like the Solzhenitsyns and Sakharovs, are counterrevolutionaries and as such must be overthrown and liquidated. You are a great power, but you have to regain the trust of the world proletariat, the trust of the peoples of the world, that great trust that Lenin and Stalin created through work and struggle...

If you follow the road of the revolution and Marxism-Leninism, if you link yourselves closely with the world proletariat, then American imperialism and the decaying capitalism in general will be shaken to their very foundations, the face of the world will be changed and socialism will triumph. You, the Soviet peoples, Soviet workers, collective farmers and soldiers, have great responsibilities and duties to mankind. You can perform these duties honourably by refusing to tolerate the domination of the barbarous clique which now prevails over the once glorious Bolshevik Party of Lenin and Stalin and over you. In your country the party is no longer a Marxist-Leninist party. You must build a new party of the Lenin-Stalin type through struggle. You must understand that the Soviet Union is no longer a union of peoples for freedom, in full harmony with one another. It was Bolshevism which succeeded in creating the fraternal unity of the peoples of the Soviet Union. Revisionism has done the opposite: it has split the peoples of your country, has aroused chauvinism in every republic, has incited hostility amongst them, has aroused the hatred of other peoples against the Russian people, who were the vanguard in the revolution under the leadership of Lenin and Stalin. Will you go on allowing yourselves to be downtrodden? Will you go on allowing the deepening of the process of bourgeois degeneration in all fields of life in your country, as the revisionists are doing? Will you accept the yoke of a new capital, under the cloak of a false socialism? We Albanian communists and people, like all the communists and freedom-loving peoples of the world, have, loved the true socialist Soviet Union of the time of Lenin and Stalin. We resolutely follow the road of Lenin and Stalin and have faith in the great revolutionary strength of the Soviet peoples, the Soviet proletariat, and that gradually express itself, through struggle and sacrifices, will be built up to the level the time demands and will smash Soviet social-imperialism to its very foundations.

The revolution and sacrifices you will make will not weaken your country but will revive the true socialist Soviet Union. They will overthrow the social-imperialist dictatorship and the Soviet Union will emerge from this stronger than ever.

In this glorious work you will have the support of all the peoples of the world and the world proletariat. The strength of the ideas of socialism and communism is based on this revolutionary overthrow and not on the empty words and underhand actions of the clique ruling you. Only in this way, proceeding on this course, will the genuine communists, the Marxist-Leninists everywhere in the world, be able to defeat imperialism and world capitalism. They will assist the peoples of the world to liberate themselves, one after the other, will assist great China to set out on the genuine road to socialism and not become a superpower so that it, too, can rule the world, by transforming itself into a third partner in the predatory wars which American imperialism, Soviet social-imperialism and the clique of Hua Kuo-feng and Teng Hsiao-ping which is ruling in China at present, are preparing.

In this glorious jubilee, we Albanian communists, as loyal pupils of Lenin and Stalin and soldiers of the revolution, remind you to think over these problems, vital to you and the world ' because we are your brothers, your comrades in the cause of the proletarian revolution and the liberation of the peoples. If you follow the road of the predatory, imperialist war, on which your renegade leaders are taking you, then, without doubt, we shall remain enemies of your system and your counterrevolutionary actions. This is as clear as the light of the day. It cannot be otherwise.

[Red_Banner]

Andropov called for Soviet economists to study the economies of the "fraternal states" in Eastern Europe, i.e. the likes of IMF members Romania and Hungary, the likes of Poland with the vast majority of its countryside in private hands, etc.

I don't see what the Union Treaty has to do with anything. It would have removed one of the few "socialist" trappings and kept it an imperialist superpower rather than modern-day Russia as "merely" an imperialist entity today. I'm pretty sure that's not something communists should support.

A better program for Soviet workers, rather than tailing the Soviet bourgeoisie, was given by Hoxha in an open letter of sorts to them in 1979:


Hoxha shit isn't ice cream, he isn't a god, he isn't right about everything.

[Ismail]

Hoxha shit isn't ice cream, he isn't a god, he isn't right about everything.I like how you don't actually address what he wrote, let alone your original absurd statement that, apparently, the biggest problem Marxists should have with Gorbachev is that he couldn't get the Union Treaty signed rather than, you know, him abandoning basic principles of Marxism (which the Soviet revisionists at least pretended to adhere towards up to then) and economic "reforms" that sank the already mediocre quality of life of the Soviet working-class, brought forward officially-acknowledged mass unemployment and inflation, etc.

[Red_Banner]

How were his reforms so different than the NEP?

[Ismail]

How were his reforms so different than the NEP?Irrelevant, since Lenin declared NEP a temporary measure in light of the disastrous economic situation created by WWI and the Civil War and the breaking-point relations between town and countryside engendered by the latter. He didn't present it as a socialist economic system, unlike Gorbachev who also contrasted it to the "administrative-command system" of Stalin.

It's nonsensical to try to compare Gorbachev with Lenin. The latter didn't renounce class struggle, among many other things. For Gorbachev, even Khrushchev's "peaceful coexistence" doctrine wasn't lame enough. "As early as 1985, when the new edition of the Communist Party Programme was being prepared for adoption at the Twenty-Seventh Party Congress in early 1986, a conscious decision was taken by Gorbachev to abandon the definition of peaceful coexistence between states with different social systems as a 'specific form of class struggle'. Gorbachev's emphasis on interdependence, universal values, and 'all-human' interests was quite different from that old formulation and genuinely new so far as the top leadership was concerned." (Brown, The Gorbachev Factor, p. 222.) "Technological and social change, [Gorbachev] argued, and particularly the advent of nuclear weapons, had created a single interconnected and interdependent world. Thus the solution of 'common human problems' such as environmental pollution, poverty, famine and avoiding nuclear war should take precedence over class conflict. 'Further world progress is now possible,' he declared to the United Nations in late 1988, 'only through a search for a consensus of all mankind.'" (Strayer, Why Did the Soviet Union Collapse? p. 123.)

Furthermore, "By accusing Stalinism of breaking with the European humanist tradition, Gorbachev indicated what he considered to be the dominant tendency in global civilization in modern times and what he believed to have been the main error of those guiding the development of the USSR. He described perestroika as designed to overcome the Soviet Union's separation from the mainstream of worldwide humanism: 'We are striving through restructuring to achieve the movement of our country into the common channel of contemporary civilization, into the common stream of civilization.'" (Evans, Soviet Marxism-Leninism: The Decline of an Ideology, p. 202.)

None of that has anything to do with Lenin. In fact it'd be great if you could defend stuff like what I just quoted, it'd just further confirm your pseudo-Marxism.

[Red_Banner]

What poppycock and fluff!

[Alonso Quijano]

56 percent of respondents have positive feelings about Brezhnev. Experts link Brezhnev’s popularity among the population to financial well-being during his epoch, which was the “peak of Soviet socialism.”

Lenin, is seen in a good light by 55 percent of Russians

one-half of Russians favor Stalin. Stalin is associated with victory in World War II, which explains why he is favored by modern Russians.

Tsar Nicholas II, who was overthrown in 1917 got kind reviews from 48 percent of respondents.

Nikita Khruschev – who was Soviet premier during the Cuban missile crisis – is liked by 45 percent of Russians.

Yeltsin is viewed positively by only 22 percent of Russians. Attitudes towards Yeltsin worsened following his reforms which lead to inflation and the closure of many businesses.

Gorbachev is seen as Russia’s worst leader ever, and only one-fifth of the population has warm feelings about the Soviet president. Gorbachev’s rule ended up with the dissolution of the USSR, which is still considered by Russians as the 20th-century catastrophe
So they hate Gorbachev who ruined the revolution but appreciate the Czar? Some consciousness.