The difficult relations between Putin and the last president of the Soviet Union

Considering what Vladimir Putin thinks of the “geopolitical catastrophe” that was the disappearance of the Soviet Union, it is not surprising that he has little sympathy for the person who was at the head of that colossal superpower when it disintegrated. In fact, it is easy to think that Putin actually often imagines how different things could have been if he had been in the position of Mikhail Gorbachev or at least in a position close to it so as to have been able to prevent the destruction of the USSR. However, his political career and the doors of the Kremlin were opened by Boris Yeltsin, who was precisely the one who deposed Gorbachev and ended the USSR. At Yeltsin’s funeral, tears came to his eyes. He now he doesn’t know whether to have a funeral for Gorbachev. In his memoirs, Gorbachev makes no mention of that gray KGB official who, when he was at the height of his international popularity, was nothing more than a second-class spy in East Berlin. The moment in which the current Russian autocrat felt closest to Gorbachev was precisely when the coup d’état launched in August 1991 failed by those who were aware of the catastrophic drift that perestroika was causing and tried to force the Kremlin to give a rudder stroke. It is curious that he resigned his rank of lieutenant colonel when the coup had already failed and justified it by saying that at that moment he “he already knew which side he was on.” If it is necessary to venture which was that side, the question offers few doubts: his own. His main support in his entry into civil life and politics was a former professor of his, Anatoli Sobchak, who had become mayor of Saint Petersburg (then Leningrad) and a kind of standard-bearer for pro-Western reforms and in a way someone who thought Gorbachev was going too slow when he wasn’t constantly blocked. It is evident that Putin is not the same after more than 20 years in power. If Yeltsin was the one who chose to separate Russia from the rest of the USSR, considering that this entire constellation of Soviet republics was a hindrance to the survival of the core of the empire, Putin has ended up thinking that there is no better future than rebuilding that space life that Russia had accumulated throughout history. Related News standard If Russia doubts about holding a state funeral for Gorbachev Rafael M. Mañueco The last president of the USSR was highly praised in the West, but little loved in his country And he thinks so because in reality Putin can be compared to Gorbachev that both have failed to reform their country. In the case of the last Soviet leader, it is blatant evidence because it simply led to his disintegration. It is true that Putin has managed to restore some order after a decade of political and economic disarray, but that is all to his credit. Russia today is a country that lives only from its hydrocarbon exports but has ceased to be a focus of technological innovation as it was in the time of the USSR, when its space industry amazed the world. Right now it is a country poorly governed by corruption and without an intellectual or scientific pulse. Society survives in an extractive economy that is limited to importing consumer goods because it hardly produces anything other than raw materials. What did Gorbachev really think of the invasion of Ukraine? As he did not make it clear in life, testimonies are now accumulating that try to interpret whether or not he was in disagreement with this war as it was when he approved the annexation of Crimea. In any case, Putin has always given a damn about his opinion. At most he must think that if Gorbachev had done things differently he would not have had to invade it, because the USSR would continue to exist.


www.abc.es