Mikhail Gorbachev — "The collapse of the Soviet Union was a real tragedy for me."
The collapse of the Soviet Union was a real tragedy for me.
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More from Mikhail Gorbachev
"I am a man of the people. I come from the people."
"I'm a realist. I see things as they are."
"Democracy is not merely a matter of procedures and institutions. It is a way of life, a way of thinking, a way of feeling."
"I have never betrayed my principles."
"The most important thing is to avoid war. Everything else is secondary."
About Mikhail Gorbachev (1931-2022)
Final General Secretary of the Soviet Union whose glasnost and perestroika reforms led to the USSR's dissolution and the end of the Cold War. Closely associated with Boris Yeltsin (his domestic rival and successor as Russian leader) and Ronald Reagan (Cold War counterpart and arms-control partner). For an intellectual contrast, see Vladimir Putin, Russian president (2000-2008, 2012-) — Putin has publicly called the Soviet collapse 'the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century' — Gorbachev's signature achievement. Putin's two-decade political project has been organized around reversing Gorbachev's liberalization.