Question by h32: what problems did Mikhail Gorbachev face home and abroad in 1988?
when he came into power in Russia in 1988 what problems did he face that the country was under??
thnx
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Answer by Jack
Several.
At home, he was facing an economy that was in near ruin. State run industries were notoriously inefficient. State run collective farms (which accounted for more than 90% of the arable land in the Soviet Union) accounted for less than 15% of the total agricultural output. The military equipment was outmoded, as was the rest of soviet technology (Chernobyl, for example).
Abroad, the Soviets were losing control of their empire in eastern Europe. The “Solidarity” movement in Poland was inspiring people throughout the Soviet empire to break free. The inability of the Soviets to muster support for a crackdown among their client states led Soviet Foreign Ministry spokesman Gennadi Gerasimov to pronounce “The Sinatra Doctrine” (which meant that the Soviet Union would not attempt to hold client states in their orbit, and allow each country to go “My Way” (in reference to the Sinatra hit record).
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augie6_1 says
By working with Mikhail Gorbachev rather than against him, Ronald Reagan helped to strengthen the growing spirit of reform within the Soviet Union. In the end, that reform movement developed a momentum all its own, pushing far beyond even Gorbachev's objectives, leading to the peaceful collapse of the Soviet Union and the rapid dismantling of the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe between 1989 and 1991.
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