In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

522 Document No. 83: CIA Intelligence Assessment, “gorbachev’s Domestic gambles and Instability in the USSR” September 1989 This controversial assessment from the CIA’s Office of Soviet Analysis separates SOVA from the consensus of the rest of the U.S. intelligence community regarding Gorbachev and his chances for success, or even survival.73 The document carries a scope note calling it a “speculative paper” because it goes against the general view that would soon be expressed in a Fall 1989 National Intelligence Estimate. That NIE would predict that Gorbachev would survive the coming economic crisis of 1990–91 without resorting to widespread repression (only targeted acts of suppression , as in Tbilisi)—a relatively optimistic conclusion that would play a major role in the Bush administration’s embrace of Gorbachev at Malta in December. In the assessment below, authored by senior analyst Grey Hodnett, SOVA takes a much bleaker view, essentially concluding that Gorbachev’s reforms will fail, precipitating a coup, a crackdown, and perhaps even the piecemeal breakup of the empire . The United States “for the foreseeable future will confront a Soviet leadership that faces endemic popular unrest and that, on a regional basis at least, will have to employ emergency measures and increased use of force to retain domestic control.” The paper further predicts that “Moscow’s focus on internal order in the USSR is likely to accelerate the decay of Communist systems and growth of regional instability in Eastern Europe, pointing to the need for post-Yalta arrangements of some kind.” What exactly “post-Yalta” means is unclear, but may simply be a reference to the new non-communist government in Poland (installed in August), that explicitly chose to remain a part of the Warsaw Treaty Organization. Under any circumstances, orchestrating such an arrangement would be a major challenge for the United States. Key Judgments:74 gorbachev and other Soviet leaders are concerned about serious future breakdowns of public order in the USSR. This concern is well justified. The unrest that has punctuated gorbachev’s rule is not a transient phenomenon. Conditions are likely to lead in the foreseeable future to continuing crises and instability on an even larger scale—in the form of mass demonstrations, strikes, violence, and perhaps even in the localized emergence of parallel centers of power. This instability is most likely to occur on a regional basis, not nation-wide—although overlapping crises and a linking together of centers of unrest could occur. 73 The background for this document comes from Lundberg, “CIA and the Fall of the Soviet Empire.” 74 Information Available as of September 21, 1989 [as indicated in original document]. Melyakova book.indb 522 2010.04.12. 16:20 523 Instability in the USSR is not exclusively a product of glasnost, and some of it is indeed a sign—as gorbachev asserts—that reforms are taking hold. But gorbachev ’s claim that instability otherwise merely reflects the surfacing of problems that were latent or repressed under Brezhnev is only partly true. The current budget deficit and consumption crisis is largely due to policies gorbachev himself has pursued since 1985. And the prospects for further crises and expanded turmoil in the future are enhanced by key policy gambles he is taking now: • In the nationality arena, gorbachev is gambling on defusing ethnic grievances and achieving a more consensual federative nation through unrestrained dialogue, some concessions to local demands aimed at eliminating past “mistakes,” a constitutionalization of union/republic and ethnic group rights, and management of ethnic conflict to a substantial degree through the newly democratized soviets. • In the economic arena, gorbachev is gambling that, by putting marketization on hold through the postponement of price reform, and by pursuing a short-term “stabilization” program, he can avoid confrontation with the public and reengage in serious economic reform without steep costs at a later date. • In the political arena, gorbachev is gambling that, by transforming the Communist Party from an instrument of universal political, social, and economic management into a brain trust and authoritative steering organ, while empowering popularly elected soviets, he can create a more effective mechanism for integrating Soviet society and handling social tensions. […] gorbachev’s gambles and the centrifugal trends they have set in motion are already viewed with extreme alarm and anger by many members of the Soviet political elite. But gorbachev’s major gains in the Politburo at the September 1989 plenum of the Central Committee demonstrated once again how difficult it is to translate conservative sentiment in...

Share