The End and the Beginning: The Revolutions of 1989 and the Resurgence of History

Vladislav Zubok: Gorbachev and the Road to 1989

VladislaV ZuBok Gorbachev and the Road to 1989 In 2009 the countries of Eastern Europe celebrated twenty years of independence from the Soviet empire and of peaceful liberation from communism. Significant amounts of new archival information and historical accounts have emerged during those twenty years. Still, a true international history of 1989 has yet to be written, and the domino effects of that amazing year need to be studied further.1 For many Eastern European politicians and intellectuals, from Warsaw to Sofia, the euphoria of the revolutions quickly gave way to new circumstances, needs and problems. Eastern European states’ paramount national interest—successfully met—was to join NATO and the European Union, and to integrate their economies with Western Europe. At the same time, they, consciously or unconsciously, built a temporal and geopolitical wall between themselves and the post-Soviet space— seeking to “Europeanize” their recent experience and adapt its interpretations to the current agenda. This contributed to a certain onesidedness in the dominant Eastern European narratives about 1989. Everything concerning the Western factors receives privileged treatment ; anything concerning the Soviet factors receives scanty treatment, is reduced to KGB manipulations, or is not mentioned at all. The role of the Western powers, especially of the Bush Administration, despite 1 On the synergy of the revolutions of 1989 and the “spillover” effects see: Mark Kramer, “The Collapse of East European Communism and the Repercussions within the Soviet Union,” published in three parts in the Journal of Cold War History vol. 5, no. 4 (Fall 2003); vol. 6, no. 4 (Fall 2004); vol. 7, no. 1 (Winter 2007); also Timothy Garton Ash, “1989!” in The New York Review of Books vol. 56, no. 17 (November 5, 2009): 4–8. 258 THE END AND THE BEGINNING their less than enthusiastic attitudes towards the 1989 revolutions, gets an undeservedly prominent place in the narratives. By contrast, the same narratives treat the place of Mikhail Gorbachev’s perestroika and glasnost as marginal at best for Eastern European developments.2 In Russia, political biases and partisan viewpoints also distort the interpretations of 1989. Gorbachev’s admirers and supporters claim that the Soviet non-use of force and support of the changes in Central Europe was a logical part of Gorbachev’s strategy to build a “common European home” and accomplish democratization of the USSR.3 Gorbachev’s critics regard the sudden collapse of Soviet geopolitical positions in Eastern Europe as a case of “criminal negligence,” and even of Gorbachev’s treason. The political and social climate in Russia in the 2000s favored the critics. A school textbook, recommended by the Russian Ministry of Education and Science, explains that Mikhail Gorbachev had surrendered the Soviet positions without security guarantees, and the expansion of NATO had “made it imperative for Moscow to pursue a more ambitious foreign policy in the post-Soviet space.”4 These partisan accounts fail to explain the dynamics of Soviet behavior in 1989. Gorbachev’s admirers do not sufficiently address his lack of interest in the future of the Warsaw Pact and CMEA, or his procrastination about the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Eastern European countries. And Gorbachev’s critics have never explained what strategies would have prevented the “loss” of Eastern Europe or 2 The best-known attempt to redress this imbalance in Western literature is undertaken by Mark Kramer. See his “Gorbachev and the Demise of East European Communism,” in Silvio Pons and Federico Romero, eds., Reinterpreting the End of the Cold War. Issues, Interpretations, Periodizations (London: Frank Cass, 2005), 187–92. 3 Anatoly Chernaev, Shest Let s Gorbachevim (Moscow: Progress-Kultura, 1993); Georgy Shakhnazarov, Tsena Svobody: Reformatsiya Gorbacheva glazami ego pomoshchnika (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnye otnosheniya, 1994); Vadim Medvedev, Raspad: Kak on nazreval v ‘mirovoi sisteme sotsializma’ (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnye otnosheniya, 1994); Alexandr Yakovlev, Muki prochteniya bytiya: Perestoika – Nadezhdy I real’nosti (Moscow: Novvostki, 1991); Eduard Shevardnadze, Moi vybor v zashchitu demokratii I svobody (Moscow: Novosti, 1991). For criticism of this, as “ex post facto rationalization ,” see K.N. Brutents, Nesbyvsheesia. Neravnodushnyie zametki o perestroika (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnie otnosheniia, 2005). 4 A.A.Danilov, Istoriia Rissii, 1945–2008 (Moscow: Prosveshcheniie, 2008). 259 Gorbachev and the Road to 1989 at least made this loss more advantageous to Soviet interests. Above all, both sides do not sufficiently address a crucial linkage between the perestroika politics and the developments in Eastern Europe.5 As a result, the Soviet role in 1989, despite several important attempts to...