How the Cold War Ended
Gorbachev wanted the cold war to end, Gorbachev and Reagan signed the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces Treaty, removed 2600 medium range nuclear missiles from Europe, slowly took down communist party by cutting support from gov'ts, took troops out of Afghanistan
Arms race was expensive, economy was in shambles
Afghanistan, financial costs, ignored the people, lacked citizen support
Collapse of the Berlin Wall, reformers assumed power, ended communist rule
Gorbachev forced to cede power to Boris Yeltsin, oversaw dissolution of Soviet Union
First democratric presidential elections in 1991, Boris Yelton who banned communist party, Ukraine voted for independence from Soviet Union, Minsk Agreement (declared end of Soviet Union), creation of Commonwealth of Independent States, Russia took over USSR seat in UN, Soviet Union had ended
Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars)
really "out there", prevent missiles from getting into the US, a lot of people were against it "waste of money", initiated during Reagan presidency, March 1983, preventative
Nuclear missiles were detected by radars in space, radar sent signals back to Earth and triggered counter-attack missiles, oncoming missiles would crash into ocean on impact with our missile
Shut down by Clinton, focused more on regional threats, $25 billion, a lot more into but no known info on how effective it would be
Perestroika and Glasnost
Gorbachev sought to improve trade relations, proposed arsenal cut "openness and restructuring"
Reagan wanted to persuade Svoets to allow for more democracy and free speech, western ways, reform, end communism
the four summits, geneva, reykjavik, d.c., moscow, famous berlin wall speech
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