Gorbachev set out to end the Cold War, however, his main aim was to end the stagnation of the Soviet economy, then to revitalize it, thus ensuring the security of the Soviet System. Ultimately Gorbachev knew that the financial burden of maintaining the military power of the USSR was too great and that its effect on the Soviet economy would ultimately undermine Soviet Security. Thus, he calculated that the USA’s huge budget deficit meat they too could not maintain their increased defiance expenditure for much longer. Hence forth, Gorbachev’s domestic policy was shaped by his policies of perestroika, glasnost and demokratizatsiya and he applied his policy of novoe myshlenie, new thinking. Perestroika was the policy o restructuring launched and the process of modernizing the USSR, originally aimed at the Soviet economy. The main aim of perestroika was to make the economic system more modern and to improve productivity. Glasnost was the policy o openness, in which people were able to openly discuss problems of past régimes and the opinions of Soviets. Demokratizatsiya was aimed at making the Soviet political system more democratic, in which elections were reformed to give greater voice to the voters, and political organizations and clubs were allowed to operate outside the control of the Communist party. In addition, Gorbachev, with demokratizatsiya, tried to make the government and the Soviet system more independent of party control.
In order for the Soviet Union to become stable again Gorbachev also had to redesign the foreign policy of the USSR. The new format of the foreign policy was similar to that of domestic policies that human rights, democracy, non-violent and freedom of conscience should become the basis of diplomacy. Publicly Gorbachev stated that the ideology of class war should nto shape the Soviet Unions diplomacy. Evidently, Gorbachev’s policy of ‘new thinking’ contained elements of traditional Soviet foreign policy that the aim of the Soviet Union would be peaceful coexistence and détente with the West. For instance he dropped the dual-track policy of peaceful coexistence to ensure Soviet security combined with the desire for the peaceful long-term victory of socialism across the world. However, there was one major difference between the old and new policy, previously there had been the idea of peaceful but competitive coexistence, this was not Gorbachev’s aim. Thus, Gorbachev opened up talks with the USA to discuss arms controls and spoke of the need to withdraw Soviet troops from Afghanistan. Furthermore, he emphasized the need for the arms race to come to an end, as all that was needed for Russia’s security was the military capacity to threaten an effective counter-attack. Despite Gorbachev’s made him extremely popular abroad, at home they were widely criticized from more conservative quarters. As main Soviets believed that they only way to insure a monopoly of power was to decrease democracy, many wishing to continue with the Stalinist system. Over the need three years a series of summits would be held between the USA and the Soviet union in order to come to an agreement about the arms control, however, many were ineffective and produced very little results with Gorbachev caving in a the last minute.
As a result of the four summits the cold war came to an end as did a reduction in arms. The first summit was held in Geneva in 1985 whereby the USSR and the USA established a good personal relationship between Reagan and Gorbachev, in which Gorbachev stated ‘nuclear war cannot be won and must not be fought.’ However, a conclusion was difficult due to the Russians constant fear of Reagan’s ‘Star Wars’ plans. Despite, several disagreements they compromised that each would agree to prevent any war between themselves and not to seek military superiority. Further restraints were placed on the relationship when the US announced that it would nt be sticking to the SALT 2 agreements because of the continued Soviet presence in Afghanistan. The following year in Reykjavik another summit was held this time the tone of the meeting was not so good natured, as a result of the Soviet Union violating the ABM Treaty of 1972 and thus escalating the nuclear arms race. Even though, Gorbachev tried to move talks towards disarmament, which lead the US to completely eliminate the ballistic nuclear missiles within 10 years. In addition, the two nations came to an agreement that strategic nuclear missiles in Europe should be withdrawn. The meeting came to a dead lock when the US refused to abandon SDI and Gorbachev insisted that there could be no more Soviet reduction if SDI was not annulated. In February 1987 the dead lock was broken by Gorbachev who accepted the NATO policy of zero-zero on the deployment of SS-20’s. Due to Soviet cooperation there was a third summit held in Washington, 1987, which resulted in the INF Tready, which agreed that all land-based intermediate and shorter ranger nuclear missiles would be withdrawn from Europe. The INF treaty was unique as never before had arms reduction talks led to the elimination of an entire category of nuclear weapons, resulting in 5% of the total number of nuclear warheads in existence. AT which stage illustrated the closing of the cold war through mutual agreed settlements. The last summit was held in Moscow, in 1988, yet before the meeting Gorbachev had took another large step in decreasing tensions in withdrawing Soviet forces in Afghanistan. Despite the summit in Moscow little was achieved as talks about SDI arose again. Over the course of the summits Gorbachev was perceived as a peacemaker, and at one point held a higher opinion than the US president.
Gorbachev’s with drawl of Soviet troops from Afghanistan is known as the Gorbachev Doctrine, which has been viewed as part of a clear policy on the part of the USSR of disengaging from the developing world in order to avoid confrontation with the USA, based on the desire for security through cooperation and improved relationship.
Through 1988 to 1989 Eastern Europe collapsed however, when Gorbachev had came to power in 1985 most of the regimes in the Soviet bloc seemed reasonably secure ands table and many of Gorbachev’s critics blame the collapse of these states, in only four years, on Gorbachev’s policies. The collapse of the eastern European regimes would play a big part in the ending of the Cold War. In 1989 US President Bush and the leader of the Soviet Union, Gorbachev, officially declared the end of the Cold War. At the end of the Cold War the US offered the USSR economic help, and informal agreements were reached. In order to receive US assistance Gorbachev had to compel with Bush’s demands, accepting the reunification of Germany. Further glitches became evident when the Baltic republics began to press for independence, however, the US was not in favor of this. As tensions increased within the USSR, the US need Soviet support in the Iraq war. However, by 1991 Gorbachev was beginning to think that US economic aid promised to him would not be given at all. Although some aid was given the US were not willing to assist the USSR unless it conformed to a capitalist economy. Matters were made worse when the KGB claimed to have evidence that the USA was attempting to bring about the disintegration of the USSR. In July of 1991 the Warsaw Pact was dissolved, leaving NATO still in existence and unchallenged, however, this promoted a group of political and military leaders decided to overthrow Gorbachev.
The Soviet Union was in ruins. Economically it was in taters and his political party saw his policies as undermining the Communist party. In December 1991, Russia declared the formation of the Commonwealth of Independent States. The on the 25 of December, Gorbchev announced his resignation as president of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev had tried to reframe a broken down economy and country, yet he failed. His policies of perestroika, glasnost and demokratizatsiya and novoe myshlenie, new thinking, were unsuccessful and ultimately brought the collapse of the USSR.
