Mikhail Gorbachev (1931-2022)

Mikhail Gorbachev, who set out to revitalize the Soviet Union but ended up unleashing forces that led to the collapse of communism, the breakup of the state and the end of the Cold War, died Tuesday, August 30 at the age of 91 after a long illness. Though in power for less than seven years, Gorbachev unleashed a breath-taking series of changes. But they quickly overtook him and resulted in the collapse of the authoritarian Soviet state, the freeing of Eastern European nations from Russian domination and the end of decades of East-West nuclear confrontation. He was a man of  remarkable vision who had the imagination to see that a different future was possible and the courage to risk his entire career to achieve it. The result was a safer world and greater freedom for millions of people. Soon after taking power, Gorbachev began a campaign to end his country’s economic and political stagnation, using “glasnost,” or openness, to help achieve his goal of “perestroika,” or restructuring. He was in Malta for the famous Malta summit in December of 1989, which ended the cold war and heralded a period of peace, soon after the collapse of the Berlin Wall. His eventual decline was humiliating. His power hopelessly sapped by an attempted coup against him in August 1991, he spent his last months in office watching republic after republic declare independence until he resigned on Dec. 25, 1991. The Soviet Union wrote itself into oblivion a day later. Gorbachev won the 1990 Nobel Peace Prize for his role in ending the Cold War and spent his later years collecting accolades and awards from all corners of the world. Yet he was widely despised at home. Many Russians blamed him for the 1991 implosion of the Soviet Union — a once-fearsome superpower whose territory fractured into 15 separate nations, re-structuring in the process the Eastern European geographic map.. Gorbachev never set out to dismantle the Soviet system. He wanted to improve it. In his memoirs, he said he had long been frustrated that in a country with immense natural resources, tens of millions were living in poverty.

Gorbachev with his wife and Pope St. John Paul II

Once he began, one move led to another: He freed political prisoners, allowed open debate and multi-candidate elections, gave his countrymen freedom to travel, halted religious oppression, reduced nuclear arsenals, established closer ties with the West. Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev was born March 2, 1931, in the village of Privolnoye in southern Russia. By age 15, he was helping his father drive a combine harvester after school and during the region’s blistering, dusty summers. His performance earned him the order of the Red Banner of Labor, an unusual distinction for a 17-year-old. That prize and the party background of his parents helped him land admission in 1950 to the country’s top university, Moscow State. There, he met his wife, Raisa Maximovna Titorenko, and joined the Communist Party. He was elected to the powerful party Central Committee in 1971, took over Soviet agricultural policy in 1978 and became a full Politburo member in 1980. It wasn’t until March 1985, when Chernenko died, that the party finally chose a younger man to lead the country: Gorbachev. He was 54. 

Medal issued for the Malta summit in December 1989

Starting in November 1985, Gorbachev began a series of attention-grabbing summits with world leaders, especially U.S. Presidents Ronald Reagan and George Bush, which led to unprecedented, deep reductions in the American and Soviet nuclear arsenals. Gorbachev also spoke out against Putin's invasion of Ukraine. A day after the Feb. 24 attack, he issued a statement calling for an early cessation of hostilities and immediate start of peace negotiations. “There is nothing more precious in the world than human lives. Negotiations and dialogue on the basis of mutual respect and recognition of interests are the only possible way to resolve the most acute contradictions and problems,” he said. Let us not underestimate the close relationship that he had with St. John Paul II, who con-currently was dismantling Communism form his native Poland.