Li Shenming et al.: The Fundamental Causes, Lessons, and Inspirations of the Collapse of the Soviet Union (Part I)
2022 marked the 100th anniversary of the founding of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and the 31st year since the demise of the Soviet Party and state. The collapse of the Soviet Union was a great tragedy and a major reversal in human history; moreover, it was a massive disaster and a profound regression in the developmental history of world socialism.
Comrade Mao Zedong and General Secretary Xi Jinping have both attached extreme importance to the study of the Soviet Union's evolution and degeneration [1] from socialism to capitalism.
In February 1965, when the Soviet Union's economy, science, technology, and military power were at their zenith, Mao Zedong—with keen perception—sensed and anticipated the great catastrophe that might, or even inevitably would, befall the Soviet Party, state, and people. He instructed the whole Party to strengthen research into Soviet issues and to use them as a mirror to improve China's own Party building and socialist modernization. In the publisher's note to Volume 3 of The Statements of Khrushchev, World Affairs Press quoted Mao Zedong as follows: "A revolutionary party and a revolutionary people must repeatedly undergo education from both positive and negative sides. Only through comparison and contrast can they be tempered to maturity and gain the guarantee of victory. We Chinese Communists have positive teachers—Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin. We also have negative teachers." He added, "If there were only positive teachers and no negative teachers, the Chinese Revolution would not have achieved victory. Anyone who belittles the role of negative teachers is not a thorough dialectical materialist."
General Secretary Xi Jinping has made profound expositions on the experiences and lessons of the Soviet Party and state collapse on many occasions. On January 5, 2013, shortly after taking office, he pointed out with deep meaning: "Why did the Soviet Union disintegrate? Why did the Soviet Communist Party collapse? One important reason was that the struggle in the field of ideology was extremely fierce. There was a complete negation of Soviet history and the history of the Soviet Communist Party; a negation of Lenin and a negation of Stalin. Historical nihilism [2] was practiced, thinking was thrown into chaos, and Party organizations at all levels became almost useless; even the military was no longer under the Party's leadership. In the end, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, a party of such great size, scattered like startled birds and beasts; the Soviet Union, a socialist country of such great size, fell apart into pieces. This is a lesson from the past!" [3]
On October 16, 2022, our great, glorious, and correct Communist Party of China was about to victoriously convene its 20th National Congress. This was a highly significant meeting held at a critical moment when the entire Party and the people of all ethnic groups were embarking on a new journey toward the comprehensive building of a modern socialist country and advancing toward the Second Centenary Goal. Around the time the Russia-Ukraine conflict broke out in 2022, Russian President Putin pointed out twice that Russia has never been defeated by foreign powers; rather, the collapse of the Soviet Union was caused by internal betrayal. He noted that Russia cannot do without socialism. Against this backdrop, attaining a further scientific understanding of the fundamental causes and lessons of the Soviet collapse—and drawing historical inspiration for governing the Party and flourishing the nation—possesses special importance, necessity, and urgency. This is of great practical and historical significance for persisting in the Party’s self-revolution, jumping out of the "historical cycle" [4] of the rise and fall of political parties and regimes, and uniting the people of all countries to solve the serious and harsh major problem that has been raised but not yet fully resolved by the international communist movement. It is essential for maintaining the Party's revolutionary nature, advancement, and purity, and for leading the Chinese people in the united struggle to build a powerful modern socialist country, comprehensively promote the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, create a new form of human civilization, and build a community with a shared future for humanity.
I. The Ideological and Political Degeneration of the Leadership Collective from Khrushchev to Gorbachev is the Fundamental Cause of the Demise of the Soviet Party and State
There are many reasons for the collapse of the Soviet Party and state, which was inevitably the result of a combination of historical forces; however, there must be one fundamental cause that played a decisive role. As Comrade Mao Zedong pointed out: "If in any process there are a number of contradictions, one of them must be the principal contradiction playing the leading and decisive role." Among the many reasons for the collapse of the Soviet Party and state, which one exactly was the principal one that played the leading and decisive role?
Even before the birth of New China, Mao Zedong was highly concerned with the major issue of how to ensure the Party and the regime would never change their nature [5]. This led to Mao Zedong’s "1944 Jiashen Dialogue," [6] his "1945 Cave Dialogue," [7] and his "1949 Examination Dialogue." [8] After the founding of New China, Mao Zedong exhausted his mind and heart to break the "historical cycle" of dynastic rise and fall, characterized by "rising swiftly and perishing suddenly." Mao believed that the high-level echelons of the Party, especially the leadership collective, were of extreme importance and decisiveness in ensuring the Party and regime never changed nature. He argued that senior Party cadres must become Marxist statespeople and that our Party must cultivate millions of successors for the proletarian revolutionary cause in the midst of great storms and waves.
On June 16, 1989, after the political turmoil between the spring and summer had been quelled, Deng Xiaoping pointed out: "As long as there is a good Politburo, and especially a good Standing Committee... any trouble can be blocked." He added, "But if the Central Committee itself loses its footing, then it’s hard to say. This is the most critical issue." In early 1992, shortly after the tragedy of the Soviet collapse occurred, Deng Xiaoping said during his inspection of Shenzhen: "If problems arise in China, they will come from within the Communist Party, not from anywhere else. The problems in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe came from within the Communist Party. If our Party has a problem, the whole country will certainly have a big problem." He also said: "Collapse can happen overnight! It is easy to collapse but very hard to build. How fast the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe collapsed! A country as strong as the Soviet Union collapsed all at once in a few months. If China does not accept this lesson and fails to pay attention when signs appear—just as there was a failure to pay attention when Gorbachev's 'New Thinking' emerged—then trouble will occur." Jiang Zemin pointed out profoundly: "In the final analysis, it was caused by the leaders of the Soviet and Eastern European parties implementing an incorrect line, incorrect principles, and incorrect policies, which seriously alienated them from the masses." Hu Jintao also pointed out that for the Soviet Party to fall and the Soviet Union to disintegrate, "there were many reasons, but a very important one was that problems arose theoretically and politically."
On January 5, 2018, General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "We often say that if the foundation is not solid, the earth will shake and the mountains will sway. If convictions are not firm, the earth will also shake and the mountains will sway. Isn't this the logic behind the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the collapse of the Soviet Communist Party, and the drastic changes in Eastern Europe? The Soviet Communist Party seized power when it had 200,000 members, defeated Hitler when it had 2 million members, but lost power when it had nearly 20 million members. I have said that in that turmoil, surprisingly, 'not one was a real man' [9]—hardly anyone came out to resist. What was the reason? It was that ideals and convictions had completely vanished." On January 12, 2016, in a speech at the Sixth Plenary Session of the 18th Central Commission for Discipline Inspection, General Secretary Xi Jinping further pointed out: "There are careerists and conspirators within the Party who erode the Party's governing foundation from within. We cannot be 'afraid to pelt the rat for fear of breaking the vase' [10], or 'talk about other things while looking around' [11], or adopt an ostrich policy. This must be stated clearly." Further in-depth study of the major historical event of the Soviet collapse and reaching scientific conclusions will inevitably help clarify—through the combination of theory and practice—the major issue raised by General Secretary Xi Jinping regarding the "careerists and conspirators within the Party eroding the Party's governing foundation." It will help address this serious major task that the international communist movement has raised but not yet, or even far from, resolved.
We often say that the economic base determines the superstructure; this is a general law in the long arc of history. We should also remember that within a certain scope and period, and under certain conditions, the political superstructure can play a decisive counter-reactionary role on the economic base and directly play a decisive role within the superstructure itself. Precisely for this reason, the Party Central Committee is the most precious and important part of the political superstructure. The Party's century-long glorious history tells us that whether seizing and establishing power or governing the country, the key lies in the Party and the key lies in people—especially in the high-level echelons of the Party and particularly the leadership collective.
The Russian people have been reflecting as well. Since the collapse, reflections from all walks of life in Russia have fully demonstrated that the fundamental cause lay in the degeneration of the Party, particularly its leadership collective. The famous Soviet dissident Alexander Zinovyev, who later changed his views, said that when he lived abroad in 1979, someone asked him: where was the Soviet system most vulnerable? His answer was: "Those places considered as solid as a fortress—the apparatus of the Soviet Communist Party, its Central Committee, its Politburo, and finally its General Secretary... As long as one places their own person in that position... in just a few months he can destroy the Party apparatus... then, the entire power and management system begins to experience a chain reaction of disintegration."
(1) The Ideological and Political Degeneration of the Leadership Collective from Khrushchev to Gorbachev
Between August and September 1970, regarding the struggle against the Lin Biao counter-revolutionary clique at the time, Mao Zedong clearly pointed out: "Whether the ideological and political line is correct or not decides everything. If the Party's line is correct, we will have everything: if we have no people, we will get people; if we have no guns, we will get guns; if we have no political power, we will get political power. If the line is incorrect, even what we have can be lost." Mao emphasized this thought many times in his later years. This important, even monumental, idea possesses the nature of a universal law. General Secretary Xi Jinping has repeatedly emphasized the need to "strengthen top-level design" and "pay more attention to the systematic, holistic, and synergetic nature of reform." Strengthening top-level design means ensuring the ideological and political lines are correct, so as to ensure that reform and opening up always maintain the correct direction and advance along the correct path. Therefore, the fundamental manifestation and expression of the Party and its leadership reside in the Party's ideological and political lines. The fundamental reason for the collapse of the Soviet Party and state, in the final analysis, was the ideological and political degeneration of the leadership collective from Khrushchev to Gorbachev.
There are various theoretical systems in the world, but only Marxism-Leninism is the scientific theoretical system concerning the complete liberation of the global proletariat and all of humanity; it is a universal truth. In a certain sense, such a scientific, open, and constantly developing theoretical system has been an objective reality since its founding by Marx and Engels. Lines include the ideological line, political line, organizational line, and mass line, collectively called "the line." The ideological and political lines are the direct manifestations of the subjective initiative of a political party or individual under the guidance of a certain theoretical system. Mao Zedong pointed out: "Whether the line is correct or not is not a theoretical question, but a practical question." According to Mao’s view, the eight aspects we speak of—faith, theory, politics, economics, organization, style of work, diplomacy, and outlook on life—are not in a relationship of parallel equality, but rather in a relationship where some command while others are commanded. Conviction, theory, and outlook on life belong to the ideological line, referring to the actual situation of a certain class, party, or individual combining with the scientific theoretical system of Marxism; this is not a theoretical problem but a practical problem of ideology. Politics, economics, organization, style of work, and diplomacy essentially belong to practical problems of the political line. In a certain sense, among these five, economics is the foundation, while politics—like ideology—is the soul and the commander. Organization, style of work, and diplomacy are specific manifestations of "professional work" in the broad sense of the political line. In the relationship between the eight aspects mentioned above, politics and economics, as well as politics and professional work, are unities of opposites. Ideological and political work acting as the guarantee for completing economic, technical, and professional work; it serves the economic base. Ideology and politics are the commander, the soul, and the "sovereign" (jūn), while economic, technical, and professional work are the "ministers" (chén). Political work is not only the lifeblood of all economic work but also the lifeblood of all technical and professional work. If ideological and political work is relaxed even slightly, economic, technical, and professional work will surely go astray. These are the main points. Mao Zedong said, "The key to all problems lies in politics." General Secretary Xi Jinping has emphasized many times the need to "be clear-cut about politics" and to continuously improve "political judgment, political understanding, and political execution." This means consciously and fully exerting the subjective initiative of the Marxist party and every Communist, and moving forward with confidence toward the continuous realization of the Party's current goals and ultimate grand goal—namely, practicing the original aspiration and founding mission—while avoiding detours. This possesses extremely significant practical meaning and profound historical significance.
Marxism-Leninism, the ideological line, and the political line constitute a highly organic unity, yet they remain distinct from one another. Marxism-Leninism is the theoretical foundation guiding our thoughts; the ideological line represents the state of cognitive understanding attained by us Communists after studying, mastering, and integrating Marxism with specific conditions; and the political line consists of the principles, policies, and specific tactics formulated by integrating Marxism with concrete practice, unifying our supreme program with our current program.
The fundamental reason for the degeneration of the Soviet leadership group was that—starting from the qualitative change under the Khrushchev leadership to the total betrayal of socialism by the Gorbachev leadership—they executed erroneous and even reactionary ideological and political lines. The Gorbachev leadership group was conceived and nurtured within the ideological and political line of the Khrushchev leadership. At that time, although the Soviet Party and state had accumulated a massive number of serious problems, the collapse of the Party and the country was not inevitable. In a certain sense, before the Gorbachev leadership took power, the Soviet Union remained a superpower with formidable national strength. It was only because Gorbachev led reform down the evil and dead-end path of capitalism that the Party and state lost the entire foundation of their legitimacy and justice for existence and development. Thus, it is extremely important for the Party and the people to correctly choose leaders and for those leaders to provide correct leadership. Clarifying this issue serves as a powerful warning and possesses great practical significance, allowing us to avoid making the same mistakes. Clarifying this issue further enables us to recognize that the Communist Party of China's choice of Comrade Xi Jinping to take the helm and lead the way is an extremely correct choice and a blessing for the Chinese nation. It leads us to more profoundly grasp the decisive significance of the "Two Establishments" and to more consciously achieve the "Two Upholds."
The ideological and political degeneration of the leadership groups from Khrushchev to Gorbachev was mainly manifested in the following eight aspects.
1. On Belief: From wavering, deviating, and abandoning to the total betrayal of socialist and communist ideals and convictions
The faith of Communists referred to here primarily signifies the cognition of and adherence to the laws of historical development of human society. From its founding in 1898 to the announcement of its dissolution in 1991, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (the party's name changed several times from the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union; hereinafter collectively referred to as the CPSU) spanned 93 years. [12] During the eras of Lenin and Stalin, the CPSU underwent the baptism of fire through the October Revolution, foreign armed intervention, domestic counter-revolutionary rebellions, and the German fascist invasion. In these harsh environments, it withstood the severe tests of consolidating socialist political power and developing the socialist cause, enjoying high prestige and possessing strong cohesion, appeal, and combat effectiveness among the Soviet people and the people of the world. However, after Stalin’s death, the ideals and convictions of the CPSU high command began to waver. By the time of the Gorbachev leadership group, they ultimately abandoned Marxism-Leninism and the nature, tenets, and goals of a proletarian party. The Party, the state, the military, and the people collapsed into a heap of loose sand, crumbling without a fight in the face of frantic attacks from hostile forces.
Looking across history, the wavering of the CPSU's ideals and convictions began during Khrushchev’s time in power. As the leader of the Soviet Communist Party, Khrushchev lacked basic cultivation in Marxism-Leninism. Mao Zedong once evaluated Khrushchev this way: "He does not understand Marxism-Leninism and is easily deceived by imperialism." U.S. President Nixon, when discussing Khrushchev, said: "He believed in the communist cause and the inevitability of its victory, but he only worshipped at the altar of theory on Sundays."
Regrettably, Khrushchev used the methods of a "two-faced person" [13] to gain promotion from Stalin. While Stalin was alive, he praised Stalin as a "natural father," a "wise leader," and a "genius." Shortly after Stalin died, in the "Secret Report" at the 20th Congress of the CPSU, he attacked Stalin as a "persecution maniac" and a "megalomaniac" who "studied the situation in the country and agriculture only from films" and "planned military operations using a globe." He claimed that "the leadership practice formed in Stalin's later years became a serious obstacle on the path of Soviet social development." In 1961, under Khrushchev's presiding, the 22nd Congress of the CPSU passed a resolution to remove Stalin's body from the Lenin Mausoleum. Thereafter, acts of destroying Stalin's statues and monuments appeared across the Soviet Union, and a wave of negating Stalin surged once again.
Stalin represented an important period of history for the Soviet Party and state and was an important symbol of both. Therefore, the evaluation of Stalin's merits and faults was not a simple matter of evaluating Stalin as an individual, nor was it an issue restricted to one party or one country. Although Stalin made various mistakes, a failure to analyze Stalin's errors historically and scientifically—to distinguish between the "mainstream" and the "tributaries" [14] of the CPSU and the Soviet Union under his leadership, and to carry out effective education and guidance—would produce extremely serious consequences. The total negation of Stalin not only negated the achievements of the CPSU and the Soviet Union during that period and seriously damaged their images, shaking people’s ideals and convictions in socialism and communism; it also impacted the worldviews and values of the younger generation. It produced a group of "gravediggers" of proletarian political power who yearned for Western capitalism, causing ideological turmoil in society. Gorbachev, Aleksandr Yakovlev, and Yeltsin were the primary representatives among them. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Gorbachev said that the 20th Congress's opposition to Stalin "was of great significance," that "this critique morally discredited totalitarianism," and was "the first attempt to move our society toward democratization." Practice has already proven that the direction of "democratization" spoken of by Gorbachev was, in essence, a naked dictatorship exercised by domestic capital in league with Western countries against the Soviet and Russian people.
Reviewing history, during the period of the Sino-Soviet polemics, the Chinese and Soviet parties developed serious differences surrounding the evaluation of Stalin and Soviet socialist practice. The Chinese Communists, with Comrade Mao Zedong as their chief representative, firmly defended Stalin’s historical status and historical achievements, demonstrating the profound insight and political foresight of Mao and the Chinese Communists. If people at that time could not yet fully see the serious consequences of mistreating Stalin and Soviet socialism, or fully understand the far-reaching significance of the CPC's advocacy for a scientific evaluation of Stalin and a full affirmation of Soviet socialist achievements, then the tragedy of the Party and state's destruction 35 years after the 20th Congress, and the world-shaking achievements of socialism with Chinese characteristics more than 30 years after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, provide us with experiences and lessons from both positive and negative sides to re-recognize that period of history and distinguish right from wrong. Looking back from the present, on the question of who was right and who was wrong, history and reality have already rendered a public verdict.
On major theoretical issues of Marxism, Khrushchev underwent a process that went from a superficial understanding to blurred tampering and, eventually, deviation. At the 20th Congress of the CPSU, he made "peaceful coexistence," "peaceful transition," and "peaceful competition" [15] the general line of the socialist state’s foreign policy, believing this could deal a "devastating blow" to all capitalist relations and realize socialism throughout the world. At the 22nd Congress, he introduced the theories of the "party of the whole people" and the "state of the whole people," beginning the transformation of the CPSU from a party of a proletarian nature into a "party of the whole people" with a bourgeois nature. The program adopted at the 22nd Congress abolished the "dictatorship of the proletariat"—the core idea of Marxism—replacing it with an abstract so-called "humanitarianism." In 1959, he proposed that the Soviet Union had entered the "period of all-out construction of a communist society," and in 1961 declared that the Soviet Union would "basically build a communist society within 20 years," calling out that "our generation of Soviet people will live under communism." These lines and programs, which were seriously divorced from the international struggle and Soviet social reality and seriously violated the principles of scientific socialism, confused the thinking of the broad masses of CPSU members and the Soviet people. They caused the Soviet Union to begin deviating from the correct direction of socialist development, sowing the seeds for the later collapse of the CPSU and the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
During the Brezhnev period, although the Soviet leadership group corrected some practical errors from the Khrushchev era and implemented some new principles and policies—allowing Soviet society to achieve a degree of development—they clung tenaciously to the erroneous theories of the 20th Congress presided over by Khrushchev. Socialist and communist ideals and convictions had already vanished among the Soviet privileged clique represented by Brezhnev. Brezhnev himself was satisfied with the status quo, sought pleasure, and was keen on the flattery of others; Marxism and communism were merely empty phrases and clichés he mouthed but did not believe himself. Brezhnev's niece, Luba, disclosed in her English memoir published in the United States, The World I Left Behind, that Brezhnev once told his brother: "What communism? It's all empty talk to fool the common people." When those above have a preference, those below will take it to excess. [16] At that time, the prevailing social atmosphere in the Soviet Union was "to say one thing and do another." Corruption was rampant. Many people joined the Communist Party not to dedicate themselves to the cause of socialist construction or communist ideals, but to fish for a government post, eventually viewing the seizure of more personal and small-group interests as their greatest pursuit. Superficially, they appeared as revolutionaries and leaders of socialist construction, playing the role of defenders of the people's and the state's interests, but in reality, they no longer held Marxist faith or socialist and communist convictions; they were focused solely on maintaining their own privileges.
Of course, during the Khrushchev and Brezhnev periods, the broad masses of Soviet Party members and the people still held socialist and communist ideals and convictions and were sincerely building socialism. The fundamental reason why the Soviet Union truly became a superpower capable of rivaling the United States in the 1970s and 80s lies exactly here. However, the political faith of the primary leaders, such as Khrushchev and Brezhnev, had already completely changed.
If the Party cadres during the Brezhnev period could at least maintain the appearance of Marxist and communist faith, by the Gorbachev period, they simply tore off their disguises and openly negated it. Gorbachev had already begun to doubt the scientific nature of Marxism as early as his university years. After graduation, the "Secret Report" of the 20th Congress accelerated his ideological transformation. After becoming General Secretary, he hoisted the banner of so-called "humanistic, democratic socialism"—a slogan that could both deceive people and achieve his goals—and began systematically destroying the Soviet socialist system. After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Gorbachev admitted frankly that communism was "an almost unachievable slogan" and that Russia's tragedy lay in the fact that "ideas that had already died in Karl Marx’s later years were chosen by Russia in the early 20th century and introduced into real society; this was a mistake." He also said that as early as his student days, he discovered that "socialist reality and ideals were poles apart," and that he felt "extremely honored" to have been able to "clear away many of the evil consequences caused by the influence of communism from people's consciousness" during the years of reform. The American economist Lester C. Thurow once said: "I happened to be in Moscow around the time of the Soviet collapse. The fundamental reason for the collapse was that Gorbachev lost his faith in Marxism and communism... Imagine, if Pope John Paul II announced today that God does not exist, what would the Christian world look like tomorrow?!"
Aleksandr Yakovlev, who served as a Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee and Head of the Propaganda Department during the Gorbachev era and was known as "Gorbachev's primary brain trust," advised Gorbachev in December 1985: "In our country's practice, Marxism is nothing more than a new religion, subordinated to the interests and capricious demands of an autocratic regime." He further stated, "The dogmatic interpretation of Marxism-Leninism poses a danger sufficient to annihilate any creative thought, or even classical thought." On August 2, 1991, in an interview with a TASS reporter, he stated openly: "Our misfortune stems from the dogma of Marxism," and "I oppose taking Marxism as a guide to action, and I am certain that socialism will fail." After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, he admitted: "In essence, not one of the specific economic conclusions upon which Marx built the edifice of his 'scientific socialist' worldview has been confirmed in practice." Not only this, but Yakovlev also spoke of capitalism with unstinting praise and reverence: "Capitalism has brought a pragmatic ethics. In the capitalist slogans of liberty, equality, and fraternity, a noble idealism is embodied..."
Another of Gorbachev's right-hand men, Eduard Shevardnadze—who served as Soviet Foreign Minister—also spoke of the transformation process of his own political thought. In 1991, responding to a question from a French television reporter, he said: "For a period, we held communist ideals and struggled for their realization. Later, I slowly realized that the things I firmly believed in were impossible to achieve, and this situation had to change. One day in the early 1990s, I said to Gorbachev: our system has rotted; it must be completely destroyed and undergoes a thorough transformation from the top down."
2. Theoretically: From neglecting and misunderstanding to deviating from, and finally abandoning and betraying Marxism-Leninism
"Theoretically" here mainly refers to the actual state of studying and mastering the basic principles of Marxism and integrating them with concrete practice. CPSU leaders following Stalin went from not reading and not understanding to deviating from, and finally abandoning and betraying Marxism-Leninism. They could neither respond to the challenges of the times nor counter the "peaceful evolution" [17] strategy of imperialism.
In his early years, Khrushchev never received a systematic education, and after entering politics, he did not seriously study Marxist theory. Vyacheslav Molotov once evaluated him by saying that Khrushchev never had much interest in, nor thought about, what Leninism or Marxism actually was; theoretically, he was completely ignorant. Former U.S. President Nixon also remarked: "I find it difficult to imagine whether he actually read Marx’s three thick volumes of Capital. In this respect, he differed from Stalin, who read extensively and wrote numerous books on communist theory." Precisely because of this, Khrushchev unscrupulously proposed erroneous theories such as the "Three Peaces" and "Two Alls" [18]. The fundamental error of the "party of the whole people" and "state of the whole people" theories lay in the complete abandonment of the Marxist-Leninist theory regarding the essence of "political parties" and the "state." These theories blurred the boundary between the Party’s class base and its mass base, elevating what originally belonged to the Party’s mass base into its class base. He believed that under socialist conditions, the exploiting classes had been eliminated, and that in Soviet society—aside from a tiny minority of criminal elements—there only existed "the whole people" based on a foundation of identical fundamental interests: a broad political alliance composed of the working class, the peasantry, and the intelligentsia. Therefore, he argued, the CPSU was no longer the party of a specific class but had become a "party of the whole people" representing the interests of all Soviet people; the CPSU had become a "political organization of the whole people." Khrushchev ignored the fact that class struggle still existed within a certain scope in Soviet society and could intensify under certain conditions. He ignored the fact that complex and sharp class struggle between socialism and capitalism still existed internationally. He ignored the possibility and danger of the socialist state being subverted by hostile forces at home and abroad. By propagating the "theory of the dying out of class struggle," he led the broad ranks of Party members, cadres, and the masses to mistakenly believe that class struggle no longer existed in Soviet society and that anti-communist and anti-socialist forces were no longer present. Consequently, they lost the vigilance they should have maintained against capitalist restoration.
Brezhnev worked as a laborer and engineer in his youth and possessed specialized knowledge in agriculture and metallurgy, but he lacked theoretical cultivation. He was uninterested in social science theory and especially lacked a systematic understanding of Marxism. After becoming the top leader of the CPSU, he spent a great deal of time and energy on hunting, driving cars, and other activities. In 1965, while discussing the first draft of the report commemorating the 20th anniversary of the victory of the Great Patriotic War [19], he said: "It is hard for me to make sense of all this. To be frank, I am not someone who does this kind of work (referring to theoretical work—Editor's note). My strengths are organizational work and understanding human psychology." He also told his assistants: "Write it simply. Do not write me as a theorist; otherwise, no matter what, no one will believe I wrote it, and they will laugh at me." He sometimes requested the deletion of quotes from Marxist classics, explaining: "Who would believe I’ve read Marx’s works!" According to relevant archives, there is no record of the top leadership of the CPSU studying Marxist works during their activities in the 1970s. Given this was the case for the top leadership, one can imagine the state of theoretical study among other Party members and cadres.
Brezhnev did not value the study of Marxist theory, nor could he scientifically grasp the essence of Marxist theory. Therefore, not only did he fail to fundamentally overcome the theoretical errors of the Khrushchev period, but he actually perpetuated Khrushchev’s erroneous views. For instance, the new Soviet Constitution adopted in October 1977 still incorporated the concepts of the "state of the whole people" and "party of the whole people" invented by Khrushchev. He also proposed the slogan of "developed socialism," emphasizing the "highly developed" nature of Soviet productive forces and the "strong" material and technical foundation. He stressed the "maturity" of Soviet social relations and the "most profound" nature of socialist democracy, as well as the unity and harmony among the various republics and nationalities of the Soviet Union. This covered up the serious latent or apparent problems in the Soviet Union’s economic, political, and ethnic policies. It denied that contradictions still existed between the productive forces and relations of production, and between the economic base and the superstructure in Soviet society. Thus, it denied—ideologically, theoretically, and practically—the necessity and inevitability of profound reform in Soviet society. Brezhnev often said, "Why change anything? Just do the work well." During Brezhnev’s 18-year reign, beneath the surface of prosperity, Soviet society accumulated more and more deep-seated contradictions. Crises, both manifest and hidden, were everywhere, planting extremely serious hidden dangers for the subsequent great social upheavals and the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Regarding Gorbachev’s cultivation in Marxist theory, his Chief of Staff, Valery Boldin, commented: "He was very familiar with Party history and Lenin’s works, and often employed this knowledge... However, Gorbachev was not familiar with the works of Marx and Engels." He was highly educated, and after graduation, he engaged in Party affairs for a long time, gaining rich work experience. Yet this young General Secretary—whom Andrei Gromyko described as "learned," "quick-witted," and "profound"—completely abandoned his Marxist faith due to the evolution of his worldview and values, eventually siding with democratic socialism. In June 1988, the 19th Conference of the CPSU officially proposed the building of "humane, democratic socialism." In 1990, the February Plenary Session of the CPSU Central Committee held that the ideal of the CPSU was "humane, democratic socialism." In March 1990, in his article "The World of the Future and Socialism," Gorbachev pointed out: "The chasm that formerly divided socialists and communists no longer exists"; their "political positions" and "worldview positions" had "converged on the basis of humane, democratic values." He stated that the "true socialism" to be realized through reform "contains the basic values originally approved by other currents of the socialist movement." In July 1990, the 28th Congress of the CPSU adopted the programmatic document Toward a Humane, Democratic Socialism, marking a fundamental change in the nature of the CPSU. Although the CPSU did not change its name, it existed in name only. Gorbachev later admitted: "During the years of reform, we wanted to make the Communist Party of the Soviet Union a social democratic party. At that time, corresponding plans had already been drafted for the scheduled 29th Congress of the CPSU. However, the rebellion (Gorbachev’s term for the 'August 19' incident of 1991—Editor's note) and the policy adopted by Yeltsin to actually ban the activities of the CPSU made it impossible to hold this congress."
The so-called "humane, democratic socialism" originated from Bernstein’s revisionism, the social democracy of the Second International’s right wing, and the democratic socialism of the Socialist International. The essence of Gorbachev’s "humane, democratic socialism" was to use deceptive banners like "humanity," "democracy," and "socialism" to implement a capitalist system throughout the Soviet Union through so-called reform. To transform the CPSU and Soviet society according to the theory of "humane, democratic socialism" meant replacing the theoretical foundation of Marxism with the old theories of Western social democratic parties. It meant abolishing the CPSU's ruling status and establishing a multi-party system, parliamentary democracy, the separation of powers, and a presidential system in the Soviet Union. It meant implementing the "de-partyization," "de-politicization," and "nationalization" of the military, as well as economic privatization and a free-market economy, thus comprehensively transforming Soviet socialism into capitalism.
Gorbachev’s set of theories and propositions did not emerge all at once; its ideological and political origins can be traced back to the Khrushchev era. A leading comrade of our Party once pointed out: "Khrushchev’s 'Secret Speech' at the 20th Congress of the CPSU completely negated Stalin, negated the Marxist-Leninist doctrines of class struggle and the dictatorship of the proletariat, and advocated such things as the 'party of the whole people' and 'state of the whole people,' throwing the ideology of the Party and the people into chaos. The evolution of the Soviet Union today had already planted various crises starting from the Khrushchev period." Specifically: first, Khrushchev’s total negation of Stalin at the 20th Congress was, in essence, a comprehensive vilification and attack on the CPSU and the socialist system; the negation of the Party’s history and the reality of the socialist system was the prerequisite for the proposal and spread of "humane, democratic socialism." Second, Khrushchev proposed "everything for the sake of man, everything for the benefit of man" as the Party’s programmatic goal; the "man" here refers to an abstract person without class distinction. This effectively took the historical idealism of humanism as the Party’s guiding ideology, which happens to constitute the theoretical core of "humane, democratic socialism." Third, the revisionist view of the "party of the whole people" and "state of the whole people"—which negated class struggle and opposed the dictatorship of the proletariat—served as the theoretical basis for the "humane, democratic socialism" line. Fourth, Khrushchev’s theory of nuclear terror denied the existence of international contradictions under the condition of nuclear weapons and advocated for international class cooperation, which also constituted the theoretical basis for Gorbachev’s "New Thinking" in foreign policy. When Khrushchev proposed revisionist views in 1956, people could hardly imagine that after spreading for over 30 years, these revisionist views would form a complete line of "humane, democratic socialism," ultimately leading to the demise of the Party and the state in the Soviet Union.
3. Politically: From weakening and distorting to completely negating and betraying Party leadership and Marxist-Leninist principles of Party building
"Politically" here mainly refers to the various major policies, programs, and actions of the Party in its own building and in the process of governing. Soviet leaders after Stalin failed to formulate and implement a correct political line. In practice, they diluted, weakened, and distorted the Party’s leadership, eventually negating the Party’s leadership, betraying Marxist-Leninist principles of Party building, admiring and copying the bourgeois democratic system, and ultimately resulting in the collapse of political power. To a certain extent, Khrushchev and Brezhnev turned the power bestowed upon them by the Party to serve the people into a tool for seeking the private interests of themselves and a privileged stratum, thereby damaging and undermining the Party’s centralized and unified leadership.
In the early period of Khrushchev’s time in power, stemming from the political necessity of opposing Stalin, he advocated for the separation of the highest Party and state leadership posts and the implementation of collective leadership. However, once his power and position were consolidated, he began to undermine democratic centralism and to marginalize and suppress political opposition. By 1958, following the execution of Beria (Лаврентий Берия) and the removal of Malenkov (Георгий Маленков), Kaganovich (Лазарь Каганович), Molotov, and Bulganin (Николай Булганин) from the political stage after they were labeled an "anti-Party group," [20] Khrushchev exercised individual arbitrariness on many issues while simultaneously building his own authority and engaging in a new cult of personality.
In 1961, the 22nd Congress of the CPSU decided to establish a system for the renewal of cadres. However, it mandated rigid requirements for every regular election: at least one-quarter of the members of the Central Committee and the Presidium must be replaced; at least one-third of the members of the Party Central Committees of the Union Republics and the krai and oblast committees must be replaced; and at least half of the members of the city and district committees, as well as the Party committees or bureau members of primary-level Party organizations, must be replaced. Restrictions were also placed on the number of consecutive terms cadres at all levels could serve: members of the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee could serve three consecutive terms of four years each; secretaries of krai, oblast, city, and district committees could serve three terms of two years each; while secretaries of primary-level Party organizations could only serve two terms of one year each. This frequent shuffling and changing of cadres caused the leadership cores at all levels to lack continuity and a sense of security, which also had an adverse effect on the continuity of work and provoked dissatisfaction among cadres at all levels.
In November 1962, Khrushchev decided to reorganize the local Party organizational structure and leading bodies, dividing oblast and krai Party organizations into separate industrial Party organizations and agricultural Party organizations. These were independent of one another and held no subordinate relationship. Simultaneously, corresponding reorganizations were carried out for the Soviets, trade unions, and Komsomol [21] organizations and their leadership bodies. Practice proved that the division into industrial and agricultural Party organizations was inappropriate. Far from producing the expected results, it caused serious negative consequences, severing the close ties between industry and agriculture, undermining the unified leadership of the Party, and resulting in chaos.
After Brezhnev came to power, he abolished the division of industrial and agricultural Party organizations, re-established unified Party organizations and leadership bodies based on regions, and adjusted the supreme leadership system, abolishing the system of frequent cadre turnover. However, Brezhnev overemphasized the stability and continuity of the cadre ranks, which resulted in a system of life-tenure for leadership positions and the aging of the cadre ranks.
By the Gorbachev period, the supreme power of the Party was overtly negated, and a highly centralized presidential system was established. This completely abandoned the essence of socialist political power—the people as masters of the country—in both content and form, turning the Party's power into a tool for overthrowing the Party's leadership and the socialist system.
Gorbachev directly inherited Khrushchev's mantle, advocating that the CPSU "exclude the dictatorship of any class." He also attacked the dictatorship of the proletariat as "tyranny" and "dictatorship" that "led to arbitrariness and lawlessness." He trumpeted so-called "general, all-people's democracy" and praised Khrushchev's theory of the "state of the whole people," [22] claiming that "the ultimate goal of reform is the comprehensive enrichment of human rights" and bringing the state system to "complete all-people character," which he believed conformed to "the political conclusion of the state of the whole people."
Gorbachev criticized Soviet socialism as "totalitarianism," arguing that the Soviet Union's "totalitarian socialism" caused "the alienation of man from politics and power, man from the means of production and property, and man from culture," creating political, economic, and spiritual monopolies. To overcome alienation and eliminate monopolies, he argued that the CPSU's "monopoly" on state power must first be ended. In February 1990, the Plenary Session of the CPSU Central Committee decided to revise Article 6 of the Soviet Constitution, abolishing the CPSU's leadership status. A month later, the Congress of People's Deputies of the Soviet Union passed the "Law on the Establishment of the Post of President of the USSR and Amendments and Additions to the Constitution (Fundamental Law) of the USSR," which removed the Article 6 provision for the CPSU's leading role and recognized that "Soviet citizens have the right to form political parties." The Soviet Union began to imitate Western countries by implementing a multi-party system.
Gorbachev also comprehensively betrayed Marxist-Leninist principles of Party building. He abandoned the guiding status of Marxism-Leninism and advocated for pluralism in guiding ideology, supporting "free competition" among various ideologies. In essence, he replaced the scientific socialism of Marxism with so-called "humanistic, democratic socialism." He abandoned the lofty ideal of communism, declaring that the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was an "autonomous political organization" and a "voluntary union of like-minded people," and that the CPSU was "prepared to engage in open competition and cooperation with other political parties and movements" and would "strive to maintain the status of the ruling party within the scope of elections." He discarded democratic centralism, promoted "the principle of universal democracy" and "renounced the rule of the majority over the minority," allowed the legal existence of factional organizations within the Party, and gave lower-level Party organizations the right to refuse to execute the decisions of higher-level ones. He abandoned the CPSU's leadership over mass organizations, declaring that the CPSU and mass organizations such as the Komsomol and trade unions were equal "partners," and that the CPSU would not interfere in their internal affairs. Guided by these concepts, the CPSU completely lost its nature as the vanguard of the proletariat, transforming from a Marxist ruling party into a parliamentary party organized for presidential and parliamentary elections.
4. Economically: From "the higher the degree of public ownership, the better" to abandoning socialist public ownership and pursuing wholesale privatization
The highly centralized planned economic system established during the Stalin era, based on socialist public ownership, played a gargantuan role in the rapid development of the Soviet Union's productive forces and the leap in its comprehensive national strength, providing a powerful material guarantee for the victory in the Anti-Fascist War (World War II). After the end of the Second World War, in a peaceful construction environment and as economic exchanges became increasingly complex, the original ownership structure and economic operational mechanisms became increasingly unable to meet the requirements for the Soviet Union's further development, and its drawbacks in the economic and social fields became more apparent. In his later years, Stalin began to reflect on socialist economic issues such as commodity production and the law of value; six months before his death, he realized that Soviet reform was inevitable.
After Khrushchev took power, he attempted to reform the highly centralized economic system of that time. However, he fundamentally failed to see the essence of the Soviet Union's economic problems. Instead, he believed that "the higher the degree of public ownership, the better," and consequently, ignoring the stage of social development and the level of the productive forces, he was in a rush to transition toward communism regarding ownership. Under Khrushchev's leadership, the "Program of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union" adopted at the 22nd Congress in 1961 explicitly stated: "With the transition to a single, all-people's communist ownership and a communist system of distribution, commodity-money relations will become economically obsolete and wither away."
Brezhnev took it for granted that the Soviet Union's productive forces were already "highly developed," the relations of production were "highly mature," and the politics were "highly democratic," and that "a new, harmonious relationship—a relationship of friendly cooperation—had emerged among the various classes, social groups, and nationalities big and small" in the Soviet Union. This estimation was clearly too high.
By the Gorbachev period, the pendulum swung to the other extreme. Gorbachev attacked the dominant status of public ownership as an "economic monopoly" that hindered people's free choice of ownership forms for the means of production, "severed the connection between man and the means of production," and fettered labor initiative. He proposed that Soviet state ownership "is the basis of the administrative-command system, a system that fetters our entire society; without breaking this system, the rejuvenation and innovation of the country is fundamentally impossible." He argued that the "primary and urgent task of reform is the comprehensive transformation of ownership relations through the denationalization of property and the abolition of monopolies."
Gorbachev also advocated for the promotion of a free market economy on the basis of denationalization and privatization. In October 1990, in his report titled "Basic Guidelines for the Stabilization of the National Economy and the Transition to a Market Economy" delivered to the Supreme Soviet, he proposed reform tasks in four stages: in the first stage of the "emergency measures plan," "denationalize and privatize property and carry out land reform"; in the second stage of the "price formation mechanism," "expand the scale of denationalization and implement the privatization of small enterprises"; in the third stage of "forming a market economy," "support business activities, denationalization, privatization, and the development of competition" and "liberate the majority of enterprises from state management as soon as possible and implement privatization"; and in the fourth stage, the "stabilization of the market" or "completion stage," "a great stride must be taken toward economic demonopolization, denationalization, and privatization." It is evident that the essence of the transition to a market economy proposed by Gorbachev was to gradually lead the Soviet economy toward wholesale privatization. The Russian economist Pchelintsev (Олег Пчелинцев) pointed out that Gorbachev’s "denationalization was privatization, which is to say, capitalization. One could say that denationalization was the initial form of privatization, and privatization was the advanced form of denationalization. At the beginning they spoke of denationalization, later they all spoke of privatization."
In April 1991, the Soviet government proposed an anti-crisis program that "stipulated comprehensive measures for denationalization and the privatization of property," even proposing denationalization for ultra-large enterprises of special significance to the country. On July 1 of the same year, the Supreme Soviet of the USSR passed the privatization law. According to this law, state-owned enterprises would be turned into leased enterprises or collective enterprises, transformed into joint-stock companies, and sold through bidding or auctions. According to the policies and laws of that time, even if the Soviet Union had not disintegrated a few years later, its state-owned enterprises would have ceased to exist, and the socialist economic base would have entirely collapsed.
After the "August 19 Incident" [23] of 1991, the "shock therapy" implemented by newly independent states like Russia was largely carried out along the direction guided by the Gorbachev era, producing severe consequences. In the later period of Gorbachev's rule, the Soviet economy registered negative growth; from 1989 to 1991, the average annual economic growth rate was -9.6%, reaching a record -13% in 1991. During the Yeltsin era, "shock therapy" openly allowed oligarchs to plunder and carve up state property. The leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, Zyuganov (Геннадий Зюганов), once pointed out that a "big bourgeoisie that madly plundered the people's property and transported it to the West" had formed in Russian society. This comprador class "seized the basic industrial sectors, monopolized natural resources, banks, newspapers, television stations, and radio stations, and held state power. They are the primary scourge that caused Russia to lose its status as a great power and the people to fall into poverty." History textbooks from the Putin era describe "shock therapy" as a "great swindle" for robbing the citizenry.
5. Organizationally: From abandoning the Party's nature as the vanguard of the working class, cronyism, and factionalism to the overt usurpation of the Party's leadership
A particular organizational line always serves a particular political line; the political line determines the organizational line. The organizational line followed by Soviet leaders after Stalin gradually became a political tool for forming cliques and organizing the destruction of the socialist system. From Khrushchev to the Gorbachev leadership group, the selection, appointment, and dismissal of cadres turned into cronyism and factionalism—the organization of one’s own small private circles. It became a tool for sectarianism and a domain for family rule.
After Stalin's death, following the criticism of the cult of personality and the arbitrary use of individual power, the CPSU Central Committee emphasized the implementation of collective leadership. However, collective leadership was only practiced for a few years. By executing Beria and labeling Soviet leaders who defended Stalin’s historical status—such as Molotov, Malenkov, and Kaganovich—as an "anti-Party group," Khrushchev eliminated dissenting opinions within the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee. With the collapse of the "opposition" and the rise of Khrushchev's personal power, collective leadership gradually existed in name only. It was precisely because of this that Khrushchev's individual arbitrariness and the authority of commandism could be established, and his many impulsive, rash, and adventurist decisions could be carried out.
During the Brezhnev period, the criteria for selecting or removing members of the Presidium of the CPC Central Committee were based solely on whether one was a trusted confidant. Brezhnev graduated from the Dniprodzerzhynsk Metallurgical Institute and had worked for many years in Dnipropetrovsk (Ukraine), Moldavia, and Kazakhstan. He gathered around himself a group of cronies who lacked both political integrity and professional competence [24]. Many of them were former subordinates and friends from the places where he had previously studied or worked, leading people to call them the "Dnipropetrovsk Gang." Tikhonov (Nikolai Tikhonov) was mediocre in both integrity and talent, yet simply because he was Brezhnev’s fellow provincial and alumnus, he was appointed Chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers. Vice-Chairmen of the Council of Ministers such as Novikov (Vladimir Novikov), Smirnov (Leonid Smirnov), Dymshits (Veniamin Dymshits), and Bodyul (Ivan Bodyul); KGB First Deputy Chairman Tsvigun (Semyon Tsvigun) and Deputy Chairmen Chebrikov (Viktor Chebrikov) and Tsinyov (Georgi Tsinyov); Minister of Internal Affairs Shchelokov (Nikolai Shchelokov); and Kazakhstan’s First Secretary Kunayev (Dinmukhamed Kunayev) were all Brezhnev's alumni, fellow provincials, or former assistants and subordinates. The "Dnipropetrovsk Gang" wielded immense power for a time, occupying prominent positions and virtually monopolizing all important power departments. For an official to obtain a promotion, the primary issue was not their personal ability, but how to establish a connection with this "Dnipropetrovsk Gang." Conversely, those whom Brezhnev did not trust, such as Shelepin (Aleksandr Shelepin), Podgorny (Nikolai Podgorny), Shelest (Petr Shelest), Kosygin (Alexei Kosygin), and Voronov (Gennady Voronov), were marginalized one by one and subsequently faded into obscurity. The Soviet diplomat Gromyko once privately lamented: "Our Politburo is like the Bermuda Triangle; some people suddenly appear here, and some people suddenly disappear."
Brezhnev’s son, Yuri (Yuri Brezhnev), became Vice Minister of Foreign Trade at age 43, was promoted to First Vice Minister at 46, and was elected an alternate member of the Central Committee at the 26th Congress of the CPSU. Brezhnev’s son-in-law, Churbanov (Yuri Churbanov), rose from a low-ranking officer to Colonel General in just ten years, later served as First Vice Minister of Internal Affairs, and was elected an alternate member of the Central Committee at the 26th Congress. Brezhnev’s four assistants—Agentov (Andrei Alexandrov-Agentov), Blatov (Anatoly Blatov), Golikov (Viktor Golikov), and Tsukanov (Georgi Tsukanov)—all entered the Central Committee at the 26th Congress. During the Brezhnev period, the promotion of the children of cadres was mainly due to their status and social connections rather than any outstanding talent. An insider revealed: "They live, receive medical treatment, and vacation in isolation; within this stratum, they often form their own family and clan relationships—one must know that the children of this stratum spend their time together, know each other, and frequently intermarry." From this, a new step was taken: "Attempting to establish a system for the transfer of power, or what might be called a system of privileged inheritance. That is, achieving the goal of inheriting power by establishing an educational system exclusively for these children, followed by a system of appointments and promotions." Brezhnev also failed to act in accordance with the Party’s democratic centralism. The 1979 Soviet intervention in Afghanistan was decided by four men—Brezhnev, Minister of Defense Ustinov (Dmitry Ustinov), Gromyko, and Suslov (Mikhail Suslov)—who then notified the Politburo. On the surface, the Brezhnev collective leadership met regularly and followed the rules, but in reality, there was insufficient promotion of democracy and full discussion; decisions were essentially made by a few individuals or by Brezhnev alone.
To accelerate the transition toward capitalism, Gorbachev began by adjusting organizational and personnel policies, finding ways to marginalize those who insisted on the socialist road or those of relatively upright character. Upon taking power in March 1985, he immediately purged Romanov (Grigory Romanov)—the man most likely to threaten his position—from the Politburo. He replaced Gromyko with Shevardnadze as Minister of Foreign Affairs, replaced Tikhonov (one of Gorbachev’s most stubborn opponents) with Ryzhkov (Nikolai Ryzhkov) as Premier, replaced Grishin (Viktor Grishin) with Yeltsin as First Secretary of the Moscow City Committee, and promoted Ligachev (Yegor Ligachev), who appeared to support him at the time, to the CPSU Central Committee Politburo. In the short year leading up to the 27th Congress of the CPSU in February 1986, Gorbachev carried out a series of major personnel changes. Of the 12 Politburo members at the 27th Congress, only four remained from the 26th Congress, including himself and Gromyko, who had nominated him as the Party’s top leader. During this period, large-scale replacements of senior leading cadres were also carried out across various local regions and departments. By February 1986, 19 major leaders of the Party Central Committees, Supreme Soviets, and Councils of Ministers of the 14 union republics (excluding the Russian Federation) had been replaced, and over 40% of the full members of the Central Committee were newcomers. At the January 1987 Plenum of the CPSU Central Committee, in a lengthy report titled "On Perestroika and the Party's Personnel Policy," Gorbachev proposed five criteria for selecting and appointing cadres, the primary one being their attitude toward "reform" (perestroika). That is to say, only those who supported his "reform" proposals could be promoted and given important responsibilities. Thereafter, he emphasized this selection standard on numerous occasions. Guided by this ideology of cadre selection and appointment, Gorbachev replaced a vast number of cadres. By early 1988, 66% of the personnel on the establishment of various ministries had been dismissed, transferred, or downsized. All ministers, department heads of central organs, and chairmen of committees were replaced, fired, or rotated several times; the cadre turnover rate exceeded 100%.
As a result, a large number of senior leading cadres within the CPSU who dared to uphold principles were successively replaced. Meanwhile, those opportunists and anti-communist, anti-socialist elements who were adept at flattery, followed the shifting winds, believed in so-called "humanistic, democratic socialism," and maliciously attacked Marxism and the socialist system were promoted and given important roles. For example, when Ligachev first took office, he was highly praised by Gorbachev and was assigned to lead the CPSU’s ideological work, holding a position second only to Gorbachev. However, when Ligachev raised questions or expressed dissatisfaction with Gorbachev’s "reform" words and deeds that deviated from the socialist direction, Gorbachev changed his tune, attacking Ligachev as a "conservative" who opposed "reform" and as a "hidden enemy of reform." Under Gorbachev’s orchestration, Ligachev was quickly removed from his oversight of central ideological work following the "Andreyeva Incident" [25], succeeded by Yakovlev, who had completely swung to Gorbachev’s side. Zyuganov, Chairman of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, noted in an analytical article published after Gorbachev’s death: "Since he (Gorbachev) took power, nearly a hundred 'number one' leaders and ministers were expelled from the CPSU Central Committee. Gorbachev gathered a group of out-and-out traitors around himself, such as Yakovlev and his ilk, Shevardnadze and his ilk, Yeltsin and his ilk, and Bakatin (Vadim Bakatin) and his ilk."
Under the suppression of individuals like Gorbachev and Yakovlev, those who dared to give honest advice out of loyalty to the cause of the Party and the people, such as Ligachev and Ryzhkov, were almost completely deprived of their rights as Party members and cadres to freely express their opinions, let alone the right to criticize and supervise Party leaders and leading bodies. This explains a question once raised by American scholar David Kotz. In June 1991, a North American social research organization conducted a survey in Moscow on ideological issues, targeting Soviet Party and state officials holding high-level power. The results showed: approximately 9.6% held a communist ideology, clearly supporting the socialist model prior to "reform"; 12.3% held democratic socialist views, supporting "reform" and hoping the country would achieve democratization; while 76.7% believed that capitalism should be implemented. David Kotz thus expressed doubt: "It is truly shocking that within the cadre ranks of the Soviet Union, the world’s longest-existing and most influential socialist state, so many people advocated taking the capitalist road." Such a result was clearly directly related to Gorbachev’s use of organizational means to promote a large number of confidants to important leadership positions in the CPSU.
6. On Conduct: From Formalism and Bureaucratism to the Deviation from and Betrayal of the Fundamental Interests of the Masses
The construction of the Party’s conduct [26] is an important component of Party building. The mass line within the Party’s conduct construction embodies the nature and purpose of the Party. The CPSU once attached great importance to the construction of Party conduct. During the Lenin period, the Party was a political party of a truly Marxist nature. At that time, the CPSU, as the vanguard of the proletariat, adhered to the purpose of struggling wholeheartedly for the cause of the people's liberation and happiness, maintained close ties with the masses, resolutely believed in and relied on the masses, and united and led the broad masses of the people to achieve the great victory of the October Socialist Revolution. Simultaneously, it raised the curtain on the great cause of socialist construction and established immortal historical merits. During the Stalin period, although the CPSU also faced problems such as being divorced from reality, it generally inherited the fine traditions of the Party from the Lenin period, maintained the Party's distinct proletarian nature and the purpose of serving the people wholeheartedly, and carried forward the Party's fine conduct of integrating theory with practice, maintaining close ties with the masses, and practicing criticism and self-criticism. Consequently, it achieved great successes in socialist construction. However, Soviet leaders after Stalin undermined the Party's conduct, and all embarked on a path of divorcing themselves from the masses, suppressing the masses, and even treating the people as enemies.
The worst manifestation of the CPSU's conduct during the Khrushchev period lay not only in inciting anti-Stalin sentiment through many fabricated and exaggerated details but also in the brutal suppression of the masses who criticized his "Secret Speech." On March 4, 1956, the masses in Tbilisi were incensed by Khrushchev’s "Secret Speech"; they took to the streets in demonstrations, shouting "Long live Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Stalin!" Khrushchev ordered the troops to fire on the masses, resulting in a bloody massacre. Between 1956 and 1957, the number of people arrested for being dissatisfied with Khrushchev under Article 58 of the Criminal Code for "anti-Soviet agitation" reached as many as 3,380, which accounted for nearly half of the total number of people arrested under this charge between 1953 and 1988.
Khrushchev's own work often proceeded from mere experience, acting on personal whims, resorting to coercion and commandism [27], and even acting on sudden impulses, doing things on a momentary whim. Thus, he committed many hasty and absurd acts. His wholesale copying of American agricultural practices, such as the large-scale planting of corn, became a major laughingstock. Instead of conducting investigation and research, he relied solely on administrative orders to blindly expand the area of corn cultivation. Because the northern climate was unsuitable for corn growth, yields were very low, and the losses outweighed the gains. Kosygin later evaluated this as a measure conceived and forced by a leader that caused enormous losses to the national economy. He also blindly advocated for large-scale wasteland reclamation, resulting in the abandonment of tens of millions of mu [28] of land. He even interfered in specific agricultural production activities, and in May 1957, he groundlessly proposed the slogan of "surpassing" in agriculture [29]. Khrushchev’s blind commandism, coercive orders, and policy errors caused Soviet agricultural production to fluctuate wildly; agricultural growth slowed during the latter part of his reign, leading to a serious grain crisis. Since then, the Soviet Union changed from a traditional grain exporter to a grain importer.
During the Brezhnev period, the Party style [30] of the CPSU deteriorated daily, and the problems of being detached from reality and detached from the masses grew increasingly severe. Bureaucratism prevailed, and a trend emerged where cadres sought sensual pleasure and lacked the ambition to make progress. The ties between the Party and the masses became more fragile, and the Party's prestige continuous declined. Many among the masses developed a sense of political distrust toward Soviet political institutions and Party-state officials, leading to phenomena such as the so-called "night people." (Note: "Night people" refers to those who maintained consistency with official propaganda in public during the day but lived their own lives at night: reading underground publications, exchanging political jokes, discussing current affairs with friends and family, attacking the powerful and the privileged, and venting their dissatisfaction with reality. — Author's Note).
This detachment in Party-mass relations led to a decline in the Party's role as a vanguard and its combat effectiveness. The masses’ sense of being the masters [31] of the country gradually faded, and the enthusiasm of the Soviet people for labor and construction ebbed, resulting in increasingly serious phenomena of absenteeism, work stoppages, and slowdowns. The unhealthy tendencies within the Party also contaminated society as a whole; corruption and bribery became fashionable social trends, and some disillusioned citizens followed the tide. This behavior of subordinates following the examples of their superiors led to a decline in public morality. A Russian scholar pointed out: "In the late 1970s, and particularly in the early 1980s, false reporting of quotas, falsification, theft of public property, and bribery had effectively become mass phenomena." The crime rate in the Soviet Union remained high, and many people took the acquisition of wealth as their sole objective, regardless of whether the means were legal.
During the Gorbachev period, the CPSU's Party style completely deviated from the nature, purpose, and goals of a Marxist party. On the one hand, Gorbachev played the role of a double-dealer; on the other hand, he practiced a "one-man rule" [32] style, tolerating no differing opinions or voices. The political views he expressed were often uncoordinated with those of others in the CPSU Politburo, and there was no mutual communication. Even Politburo members only learned of many of his initiatives and promises from the newspapers. Even during meetings, he "was neither good at, nor fond of, nor willing to listen to others' opinions; he was only good at, fond of, and willing to indulge in grandiloquence, engaging in endless talk and wordplay, presenting fundamentally hollow and rigid ideas as if they were brilliant." By the late stage of Gorbachev’s reforms, the principle of collective leadership was further sabotaged; the Politburo would go months without meeting, and everything was decided by him alone. Ryzhkov said that he "always liked to practice one-man rule." Roy Medvedev also noted that Gorbachev was "very autocratic," that "the various meetings he chaired lacked a democratic style," and that "when he heard dissenting opinions or critical words, he often lost control."
After the indiscriminate copying of the Western multi-party system and parliamentary democracy, representative figures of anti-communist and anti-socialist forces, representatives of ethnic separatist forces, and various opportunistic elements were elected as CPSU delegates or people's deputies at all levels of the Soviet Union. When the 27th Congress of the CPSU was held in February 1986, there were still 1,705 worker delegates among the 5,000 delegates. However, by the 28th Congress in July 1990, of the 4,683 delegates present, there were only 543 worker delegates—less than one-third of the number at the previous congress and only 11.6% of the total. There were also only 225 peasant delegates. Meanwhile, approximately 60% of the delegates were so-called "People's Deputies of the USSR" or "People's Deputies" elected from the various union and autonomous republics during Gorbachev’s "democratization" period. These so-called "representatives" nominally represented the people, but in reality, they engaged in activities that harmed the people's interests. Gennady Osipov, an Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Director of the Institute of Social and Political Research, said that regarding the Democratic Reformers that emerged during Gorbachev's rule, "their representative Gavriil Popov said: 'We do not consider the people; we simply want to deliberately create a state of comprehensive shortage.'"
Gorbachev's severe corruption of the CPSU's fine Party style not only destroyed the Party's cohesion but also further disintegrated the Party's class and mass foundations, causing the masses to completely lose trust in the Party. Ryzhkov once said heart-wrenchingly that by 1990, the CPSU "was already slowly approaching death." During Gorbachev’s rule, the CPSU experienced a rare wave of Party resignations. At the 27th Congress in February 1986, the total number of Party members was 19 million, but by July 1, 1991, only 15 million members remained, returning to 1973 levels. Even among those who did not leave the CPSU, their ideals and convictions generally wavered; they lacked trust in the CPSU and its leaders and felt confused about the future of the Party and the state. At the time, an editorial director at a Moscow television station put it this way: "I was once a proud Communist Party member and actively participated in various activities of the Party organization. However, people like Gorbachev, under the banner of reform, were actually fighting for power and the presidency, giving no consideration to the aspirations and requirements of the vast number of Party members and the masses. They had long since become a special bureaucratic stratum standing high above everyone else. With such leaders and such a terrible Party style, how could we possibly continue to follow them?"
7. Foreign Policy: From Fearing the US and Seeking Hegemony to Catering and Surrendering to Western Imperialism Headed by the United States
Foreign relations are an extension of domestic politics. Since socialist states first appeared on Earth, various contradictions and conflicts have existed between the two social systems of capitalism and socialism. The ruling party of a socialist country must be adept at seizing opportunities and adjusting policies to steer international relations toward peace, development, and the progress of human civilization as much as possible. At the same time, it must maintain a clear head and fully recognize that various contradictions and struggles still exist internationally between the two ideologies, the two social systems, and the two paths of development—some of which are exceptionally sharp.
After the end of the Stalin era, Soviet leaders, in handling relations with the United States, went through three stages: attempting to engage in Soviet-US cooperation to dominate the world, competing with the US for global hegemony, and surrendering to the US while betraying the interests of the state and the nation.
Regarding the question of the forms of transition to socialism for different countries, Khrushchev particularly emphasized the possibility of using the "parliamentary road" to transition to socialism. He said that in today's world, "as long as the working class can unite the laboring peasantry, the intellectuals, and all patriotic forces around itself, and give a resolute rebuff to those opportunist elements who cannot give up their policy of compromise with the capitalists and landlords, it is possible to defeat the reactionary anti-people forces, win a stable majority in parliament, and transform parliament from an organ of bourgeois democracy into a tool truly representing the will of the people." He added that with such a stable parliamentary majority, "conditions can be created for the realization of fundamental social transformation for the working class in a series of capitalist countries and former colonial countries."
Khrushchev’s theory of "Three He's" [33] did recognize that the two social systems have a side of mutually beneficial cooperation and proposed strengthening dialogue and peaceful coexistence, which was conducive to stabilizing the international situation of that time. However, the crux of the matter was not whether socialist countries wanted peace, "peaceful coexistence," or "peaceful competition" with capitalist countries, but rather whether the conditions and possibilities for realizing such desires existed at the time. Against the background where the West had already launched and was intensifying its push for the "peaceful evolution" [34] of the Soviet Union, Khrushchev’s proposal of "peaceful coexistence" and "peaceful competition" was nothing more than wishful thinking. When fantasy turns into unrealistic practice, harm is inevitable. Although Khrushchev moderated his stance somewhat after hitting a wall, this foreign policy line largely served to disintegrate the CPSU's ideological armament, leading to a lack of necessary precautions against the West and providing a breakthrough point for hostile forces to implement their strategy of peaceful evolution. An even more serious harm lay in the fact that the CPSU failed thereafter to thoroughly recognize the essence of Khrushchev's erroneous thinking, allowing it to resurface during the Gorbachev period.
The "parliamentary road" cherished by Khrushchev was also criticized and even opposed by the Communist parties of most other countries. The Communist Party of China believed that Khrushchev mentioned only peaceful transition and not non-peaceful transition, and further described peaceful transition as "striving for a majority in parliament and transforming parliament from a tool of the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie into a tool of genuine people’s power." This essentially used the so-called "parliamentary road" of the opportunists of the Second International to replace the path of the October Revolution, tampering with the basic principles of Marxism-Leninism concerning the state and revolution. It should be noted that the introduction of Khrushchev's theory of "peaceful transition" had a serious negative impact on the international communist movement at the time. Communist organizations in the capitalist world split into two opposing camps based on whether they insisted on armed struggle or took the parliamentary road, thereby weakening their own strength. Moreover, from then on, an increasing number of Communist parties became keen on parliamentary struggle and began to view those that still insisted on armed struggle as outliers, making them subjects of ridicule or even targets of attack. This was also an extremely abnormal phenomenon.
In 1982, US President Ronald Reagan delivered a speech to the British Parliament representing the general objectives of US foreign policy. He argued that in the struggle between the two different social systems at that time, the ultimate decisive factor was not nuclear bombs and rockets, but a contest of will and ideas, clamoring that "the march of freedom and democracy will leave Marxism-Leninism on the ash-heap of history." In light of Gorbachev’s new characteristic of downplaying class struggle and ideological struggle, Reagan timely proposed engaging in a "peaceful competition of ideas and values" with the Soviet Union. He expressed the intent to influence the Soviet people through the "dissemination of ideas and information" and to "help" the Soviet people establish "independent trade unions," churches, political parties, universities, newspapers, and judicial institutions. Through these "institutions in which democracy is pregnant," the Soviet Union would ultimately achieve "democratization" according to the Western model. In 1989, shortly after entering the White House, George H.W. Bush also proposed a new strategy called "Beyond Containment." Bush stated that the scale of this strategic goal exceeded the "imagination of all predecessors"; it did not merely contain Soviet expansion but aimed to "integrate the Soviet Union into the international community," tear down the Berlin Wall, and merge East and West Europe into a "complete and free Europe."
Facing the powerful offensive of peaceful evolution toward the Soviet Union by the Western bloc headed by the United States, Gorbachev advocated the elimination of the "image of the enemy" from policy and ideology, announcing that there were no longer enemies in international relations and that "all humanity is moving towards grand cooperation." He believed that political positions should be freed from narrow ideological prejudices and that "the interests of survival and the prevention of war are universal and supreme." He proclaimed that the interests and values of all humanity "stand above all else," advocated for the "de-ideologization" and "humanization" of international relations, promoted the "integration" of the two major social systems (socialism and capitalism), and argued that socialism should "push values of universal significance to the top priority."
The "humanization" of international relations advocated by Gorbachev objectively catered to and cooperated with the requirements of the imperialist strategy of peaceful evolution [35]. Soviet foreign policy shifted from seeking cooperation with major Western powers toward a gradual capitulation to the United States and its allies. Regarding relations with the U.S., the Soviet Union initially abandoned confrontation to seek cooperation; however, as its domestic crisis deepened and pressure from Western nations like the U.S. increased, Gorbachev continually made major concessions, eventually becoming dependent on the U.S. and its allies. On issues such as disarmament, reducing military spending, arms control, and the reduction of nuclear weapons, Gorbachev completely accepted American demands and even exceeded them to demonstrate "sincerity," such as the September 1991 announcement to withdraw Soviet troops stationed in Cuba. In negotiations with the U.S. over nuclear reductions, Gorbachev repeatedly violated established Soviet negotiating baselines, making unprincipled "impromptu" concessions to the Americans.
On April 14, 1987, Gorbachev met with U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz at the Kremlin for talks on reducing intermediate-range missiles. The Soviet Union possessed over one hundred new CC-23 missiles with a maximum range of under 400 kilometers; these did not fall under the category of intermediate-range missiles and were thus outside the scope of the agreement being prepared. However, Shultz insisted on reducing the CC-23 missiles, a demand opposed by both Soviet negotiators and military experts. When negotiations reached a stalemate, Gorbachev changed his stance at the last minute and agreed to the American demand. Staffers close to Shultz described this sudden step taken by Gorbachev as "manna from heaven." Similar incidents occurred many times during U.S.-Soviet nuclear disarmament negotiations, to the point that Shultz proudly reported to the U.S. government: "We made no concessions, yet what we gained was far beyond expectations."
Regarding policy toward Eastern European countries, Gorbachev also adopted an attitude of complete abandonment. On one hand, he stood by or even connived at the anti-communist and anti-socialist activities occurring within these countries. On the other hand, he adopted an attitude of tacit consent toward the demands of "democrats" in these nations to condemn and investigate the "historical crimes" of the Soviet Union and to re-evaluate major events in the history of their relations with the USSR. This resulted in the collapse of the socialist camp formed by the Soviet Union and Eastern European countries. On July 1, 1991, the Warsaw Treaty Organization (the Warsaw Pact) was officially dissolved. Ironically, as the counterpart to this military organization, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) did not dissolve along with the Warsaw Pact. Instead, it strengthened its military functions, becoming a military tool for major Western powers to bully weak and small nations and to promote hegemonism and power politics in the post-Cold War era.
The military conflict that broke out between Russia and Ukraine on February 24, 2022, though stemming from complex reasons, undoubtedly has its source in NATO’s perfidy following the collapse of the Soviet Union. Ignoring Russia's national security concerns and serious warnings, NATO expanded eastward five times. From 1999 to 2020, NATO not only admitted former Eastern European countries such as Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia, Slovenia, Montenegro, and North Macedonia, but also brought Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania—formerly parts of the Soviet Union—under its banner. NATO further intended to relentlessly turn Ukraine into a member state, extending the NATO defense system to the Russo-Ukrainian border. The North Atlantic Treaty stipulates that an armed attack against any one of the signatories shall be considered an attack against them all. Ukraine's accession to NATO would pose an unprecedented threat to Russian national security. After Putin’s hopes were dashed—following Ukraine’s refusal to pledge to forego joining NATO and declare neutrality—he reached the end of his patience and made the decision to send troops into Ukraine. The root cause of the Russo-Ukrainian military conflict is that Western hegemonic forces, led by the U.S., took advantage of Russia's decline following the Soviet collapse to "hit someone while they are down" [36], constantly compressing Russia's strategic space. This also demonstrates that NATO is moving against the trend of history, continuing to uphold a Cold War mentality and engage in hegemony, becoming the primary culprit affecting the security and stability of Europe and the world.
In a commentary following Gorbachev’s death, Gennady Zyuganov, Chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, reviewed Gorbachev’s process of dissolving the Warsaw Pact and angrily condemned Gorbachev’s compromise with, surrender to, and betrayal of Soviet national interests to the West. He pointed out: "In December 1989, when Gorbachev met with U.S. President Bush and Secretary of State Baker in Malta... Gorbachev said to Bush without any reason: 'We have decided to dissolve the Warsaw Pact and withdraw from Eastern Europe.' Baker later recalled that after Gorbachev made this statement, the American delegation even began to sweat because of the news, thinking Gorbachev would immediately put forward higher demands—for example, demanding that the U.S. dissolve NATO. Но then Gorbachev surprised the American side again, saying: 'No, we are now implementing New Thinking [37], therefore we dissolve the Warsaw Pact, and you can do whatever you want.' The entire security system of the Soviet Union, for which 27 million of the Motherland’s finest sons and daughters fought and bled, was buried just like that. During the Great Patriotic War [38], almost every Soviet family suffered losses."
In May 1987, a West German youth named Mathias Rust piloted a private plane to "visit the Soviet Union" and landed safely on Red Square in Moscow. This incident caused a worldwide sensation and caused the superpower Soviet Union to lose face entirely; as a result, Soviet Defense Minister Sergei Sokolov was dismissed. However, based on facts exposed by involved parties after the collapse of the Soviet Union, it is certain that Sokolov suffered a grave injustice. Ensuring Rust’s flight safety in Soviet airspace had been tacitly approved by the Soviet "top leadership." The real purpose was to create a pretext to strike at high-ranking Soviet military generals who opposed Gorbachev’s unilateral disarmament, clearing the path for the future dissolution of the Warsaw Pact. According to Russian Colonel General Leonid Ivashov, when Gorbachev summoned Defense Minister Sokolov in February 1987, he withheld two air defense maps of the Soviet Union's northwestern region. Evidence suggests these top-secret maps were provided at Gorbachev's request; Gorbachev withheld the maps in violation of regulations and never returned them. Existing evidence shows that Rust's flight path demonstrated he was intimately familiar with the locations of radiolocation tracking stations in the northwestern Soviet Union. From this, it can basically be concluded that in the Rust incident, there were large-scale political conspiracies involving high-level Soviet leadership headed by Gorbachev. Vladimir Kryuchkov, then Deputy Chairman of the KGB, stated that he ensured Rust’s flight to Moscow according to Gorbachev’s instructions.
To seek Western support and aid, Gorbachev also tried his best to satisfy U.S. and Western demands on Soviet domestic issues. During a visit to London in December 1984, Gorbachev showed Margaret Thatcher a Soviet military map marked with classification labels and the targets of Soviet missiles against the UK, assuring her that "all of this must end, and it must end as soon as possible," implying that he would take major "destructive" actions against his own country once in power. Thatcher was both surprised and delighted, calling Gorbachev a "man we can do business with." This was even more true regarding the issue of allowing the three Baltic states to become independent. The two high-quality U.S.-Soviet summits held in Reykjavik in October 1986 and Malta in December 1989 both touched upon the sensitive issue of the three republics—Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia—seceding from the Soviet Union. According to official Soviet reports, Gorbachev’s meeting with Reagan in Reykjavik ended without result, but Valery Ivanov, a Lithuanian law enforcement official, confirmed that in 1989 he saw a Lithuanian-language pamphlet published by the Vatican. According to its contents, among the four issues discussed in the secret talks between Gorbachev and Reagan in Reykjavik, the third was the secession of the three Baltic republics from the Soviet Union. As for the 1989 Malta summit, the memoirs of Jack Matlock Jr., the last U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union, state that during the talks, "Bush brought to Gorbachev's attention that the United States had never recognized the Soviet occupation of the three Baltic states, nor does it recognize it now." The U.S. President clearly hinted that Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia were not inherent territories of the Soviet Union, and he stood on the side of the forces fighting to secede. Gorbachev did not offer any rebuttal to the U.S. President’s interference in the Soviet Union’s internal affairs, but merely "explained the particularities of the Soviet situation to the U.S. President" in a downplayed manner, and even guaranteed that the handling of the issue of these three countries would be limited to non-violent means. This indicates that Gorbachev and Bush reached a secret verbal agreement in Malta: Gorbachev promised not to use force, while Bush promised that the U.S. would not create more problems for Gorbachev. After the Malta summit, separatist forces in Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia accelerated their pace of secession. Anatoly Gromyko, son of Andrei Gromyko, believes that Gorbachev lost completely at Malta, and that the Malta summit was "the Soviet Union’s Munich" [39].
With the Soviet Union in both domestic and international straits, Gorbachev even went so far as to abandon national dignity to beg the West. In July 1991, Gorbachev participated in the G7 summit in an informal capacity. Before leaving, Gorbachev hurriedly sent a 23-page Soviet "reform plan" to the G7 leaders, hoping that Western countries would increase investment in the Soviet Union, provide a large number of consumer goods, and cancel or delay the $65 billion foreign debt owed by the Soviet Union. Submitting a country’s internal affairs to Western nations for discussion was in itself an act of forfeiting national sovereignty and humiliating the nation. However, faced with this humiliating plan (which people at the time called the "begging plan"), the Western bosses' answer was "no money"! U.S. President Bush’s answer was even more blunt, saying that the leaders attending the summit "will not do anything to show that we are neglecting the developing democratic systems in Eastern Europe in order to aid the Soviet Union; this is not the time to give a blank check."
Gorbachev’s "New Thinking" in foreign policy essentially and fundamentally denied the Marxist theory of class struggle, abandoned basic Marxist viewpoints on international issues, and forfeited autonomous power, causing the Soviet Union to bind its own hands and feet and admit defeat when facing the offensive of the international bourgeoisie. This point was clearly seen even by bourgeois politicians.
Jack Matlock Jr. pointed out that the theory of class struggle was the central concept upon which the Leninist view of the evolution of state structures and the Cold War with the West were based. Without it, the justification for the Cold War would no longer exist, and the theoretical foundation for the one-party dictatorship would disappear. He noted that until this theory (referring to the theory of class struggle—Editor’s Note) was genuinely abandoned by the official authorities, any change indicating an improvement in relations might be illusory or at most temporary. He further stated that as long as the Soviet Union did not abandon the ideological core of its system—the concept of class struggle—the Cold War would never stop; and once it was abandoned, the system itself would no longer have any theoretical basis. He specifically mentioned: "If Soviet leaders are truly willing to abandon this concept [class struggle], then it no longer matters whether they continue to call their guiding ideology 'Marxism.' It would already be a different kind of 'Marxism' implemented in a different kind of society. This different society would be one that we can all recognize."
Another famous American politician, Zbigniew Brzezinski, pointed out the essence of Gorbachev’s "reforms" as early as 1989. He said: "The new Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has gradually embarked on the path of revisionism in the process of reform... He not only wants to change the Soviet economic structure but also to revise the ideological basis of the Soviet system, and even to change the Soviet political procedures to a certain extent." "The impact of a revisionist General Secretary appearing in the Kremlin is enormous," and "its particularly serious danger lies in disintegrating the common Marxist-Leninist theory of world communism." One day, the CPSU would "lose its monopoly control over society," and "the Soviet Union could disintegrate at any time."
8. On the Outlook on Life: From Individualism Seeking Personal Promotion and Small-Family Privileges to Becoming Ambitious Plotters and Conspirators Who Subvert the Party and State Power
One's outlook on life and values are, in essence, a question of "for whom one lives." We often speak of the "Three Outlooks"—worldview, outlook on life, and values; in a certain sense, among these three, the outlook on life holds decisive significance. The outlook on life connects to the worldview at one end and to values at the other, much like the "first button" of a shirt that General Secretary Xi Jinping has said must be fastened correctly [40]. If Party members and cadres only consider personal promotion and a comfortable life for their small families, pursuing material enjoyment, it will inevitably lead, under specific conditions, to forming cliques for private gain [41], and even development into careerists and conspirators.
A report once disclosed on the internet claimed that in a 1943 battle, Leonid (Леонид Хрущёв), the son of Khrushchev, lost contact with his flight group while piloting a fighter jet. It was later confirmed that he was captured by German forces and defected. Upon learning of the situation, Stalin ordered that Leonid be brought back to the Soviet Union, a mission successfully carried out by Soviet counter-intelligence. After Leonid returned to the country, Stalin requested the Soviet leadership discuss the issue of sentencing. Beria pointed out that they held evidence of Leonid’s crimes and that he had been pardoned twice before; he could not be pardoned again. Malenkov, Kaganovich, and others all agreed to sentence Leonid to death. The Moscow Military Tribunal quickly issued a death sentence, and Leonid was executed. One perspective holds that Khrushchev harbored a grudge because of this, and after coming to power, he not only launched the "De-Stalinization" movement but also took revenge on Beria, Malenkov, and others who had agreed to Leonid's execution.
After becoming General Secretary of the Party, Brezhnev let out a long sigh of relief and said, "I have finally endured until this day!" When his mother came from the countryside to visit him, he proudly showed her his exquisite furniture and luxurious villa with an air of complete self-satisfaction. "Brezhnev’s lifestyle, words, and deeds had an impact on those around him and on the entire upper echelon of the Party." Brezhnev used his authority to enjoy unparalleled privileges. He was notoriously fond of hunting, living in luxury villas, and collecting high-end automobiles. Brezhnev also loved various expensive gifts; the presents he accepted could be described as "innumerable." These did not belong to him as personal property and should have been turned over to the state, but Brezhnev took most of them for himself. Brezhnev’s granddaughter, recalling her grandfather’s life, mentioned that his collection of high-end cars reached as many as a hundred. Brezhnev believed that "the 'shadow economy,' the looting of public facilities, and bribery among cadres were all normal."
Brezhnev’s indulgence and condoning of the corrupt behavior of his cronies and relatives were even more notorious. In the late 1970s, Yuri Andropov (Юрий Андропов), then head of the KGB, prepared to launch a struggle against embezzlement and corruption but met with Brezhnev’s opposition. Brezhnev would not allow Andropov to investigate the serious corruption within the Ministry of Internal Affairs controlled by Shchelokov. When Andropov submitted a report reflecting the state of domestic corruption to Brezhnev, Brezhnev was very displeased. He changed his previously intimate relationship with Andropov, refusing to see him for three months and even refusing to speak with him on the telephone. It was only after Andropov changed the content of the report to a "peace and safety" bulletin that Brezhnev restored their good relations.
Brezhnev and his cronies, on the one hand, continuously increased the types of privileges available, and on the other hand, rarely stopped—and even permitted or encouraged—the pursuit of privilege by cadres at all levels. This led to an increasing number of Party and government officials enjoying privileges, gradually forming a privileged stratum. Raisa Gorbacheva (Раиса Горбачёва), Gorbachev’s wife, later recalled: "After moving to Moscow in 1978, I made many discoveries, one of which was that certain state leaders, including Party leaders, had built private villas for themselves, their children, and their grandchildren in addition to the state villas provided to them. This luxury and audacity shocked me."
The pursuit of a privileged life by the highest leadership of the CPSU, headed by Brezhnev, served as a "role model" that fueled corruption within the Party. After Gorbachev came to power, his first thought was to seek benefits for himself and his family, and the "First Family" lived a luxurious and flamboyant lifestyle. Just after taking over as General Secretary, he instructed his subordinates to build new luxury villas and other vacation spots by the sea. The six-bedroom Gorbachev residence on the Lenin Hills was particularly conspicuous; pedestrians could see it from a distance, and it became a tourist sight in Moscow.
According to the recollections of Boldin, Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Secretariat and Chief of Staff for Gorbachev, people had been discussing the difficulties facing the country since January 1991. The nation was in a political and economic crisis. Some warned that the national economy was sliding and that the Union itself was likely to collapse. However, "the President was thinking of other things: he was frantically doing everything possible to raise his currently very low approval rating, preparing to publish his new book, and helping his wife publish her autobiography. Someone had already guaranteed to pay Raisa a large sum of cash for the book immediately, and the publication of their other works was also underway. Raisa’s book was to be published and distributed in the Soviet Union; she often called me to ask which publishing house would be most suitable for her debut work." Although "the President's family would also face difficult times, they had hard currency in the bank. The royalties from Gorbachev’s works, plus the copyright fees paid to him by the Union Copyright Agency, had long ago funneled more than $1 million into his account. He had accepted many gifts made of precious metals and various hard currency awards; furthermore, he had other property. I grew vigilant and wondered whether the President cared about the fate of the country, and whether he could find the time to handle state affairs and the economic and social plight facing the people."
The power-holders of the Gorbachev era took the opportunity of privatization reforms to line their pockets at public expense, turning public assets into private ones and swallowing public property on a massive scale. The results of the hard work and accumulation of several generations in the Soviet Union were transformed in an instant into the wealth of a small number of people. After the disintegration of the Soviet Union, more than 40% of the Russian business elite came from the former CPSU bureaucracy. Among the owners of the 100 largest private enterprises in Russia between 1992 and 1993, former Party and government elites, entrepreneurs, bankers, and their families accounted for 62%.
The new bourgeoisie spawned by the reforms became the class basis for smashing the CPSU and dismantling the Soviet Union. When analyzing the causes of the collapse of the Soviet Union, Ligachev noted with emotion that objective causes for the collapse did not exist; they were basically subjective. First was the degeneration of the upper leadership. They primarily worked to accumulate wealth for themselves and wanted to rule the people without limit; they later became millionaires, tens-of-millionaires, or even billionaires. They are the people represented by Gorbachev and Yeltsin. This wealth was brought about by plundering the wealth of the people. They had a strong desire to possess private wealth, but at that time, the Soviet Party and people did not allow it.
Osipov said: "Starting from the time of Khrushchev, the leadership of our Party began to rot. What was the main purpose of these people who wormed their way into the Party and attempted to continuously rise? After joining the Party, it meant being able to go hunting in Africa, arranging things for one's children and grandchildren, and arranging one's own family. The degeneration and final collapse of the Communist Party actually occurred at the most fundamental level of the family."
David Kotz provided a profound analysis: "Although the material interests of the Soviet elite greatly increased, if compared with the elites of Western capitalist countries, the material privileges they enjoyed paled in comparison"; "Under the Soviet system, the income gap between the upper and lower levels of society was much smaller than the gap under the capitalist system." "Under the Soviet system, the salary of the highest leader was about 8 times that of an average industrial worker," and "the compensation of a general manager of a large enterprise was about 4 times that of an average industrial worker," while the income of the high-level elite in the United States is 150 to over 400 times that of an ordinary worker. "Under the Soviet socialist system, it was almost impossible to accumulate material wealth through legal channels. Soviet leaders who accumulated material wealth were always fearful, dreading that one day they would be discovered or prosecuted." Therefore, "the collapse of the Soviet system" "originated from its own ruling elite's pursuit of personal interests."
Once extreme individualists climb to high positions in the Party and the state, they inevitably degenerate into careerists and conspirators, becoming the most primary and dangerous enemies within a Marxist governing party. Precisely for this reason, Comrade Mao Zedong, during the struggle against the Lin Biao counter-revolutionary clique, repeatedly cautioned high-level Party cadres: "Practice Marxism, not revisionism; unite, and don't split; be open and aboveboard, and don't intrigue and conspire" [42].
Some domestic scholars argue that the "Secret Report" delivered by Khrushchev at the 20th Congress of the CPSU in 1956 arrived through perfectly standard organizational procedures. This claim is not factual. As early as 1996, Russian historian Nikolai Barsukov, based on a rigorous study of the full recordings of Khrushchev’s memoirs and declassified archival materials, reached the following conclusion: when the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU decided to present a report on the cult of personality to the Party Congress and announced this decision to the Central Committee Plenum, only the investigative report drafted by Pospelov [43] was actually prepared. Much of the content later delivered at the secret session was added privately by a small circle of individuals, including Khrushchev. Furthermore, the session where the "Secret Report" was delivered was chaired not by the Presidium of the 20th Party Congress, but by the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU. Afterward, many people asked: was this a continuation of the 20th Congress or some other meeting? The renowned Russian theorist Richard Kosolapov stated that Khrushchev’s "Secret Report" was "concocted by a tiny clique and brought to the Congress without collective consent." He argued that "his actions were essentially anti-Party," and therefore, "strictly speaking, the later-lauded '20th Congress Line' or '20th Congress Spirit' never attained legal status within the Party."
Many people, both in China and abroad, primarily view Khrushchev through the lens of his crude and "candid" side—symbolized by his pounding a shoe on the rostrum at the United Nations—but know little of his other side as a conspirator. For instance, in March 1939, during a speech of about 20 minutes at the 18th Congress of the CPSU(B), Khrushchev offered effusive praise for Stalin 32 times, concluding with the shout: "Long live our dear Stalin, the greatest genius of humanity, the teacher and leader who leads us victoriously toward communism!" In December of the same year, in an article celebrating Stalin’s 60th birthday, he flattered him by writing: "The peoples of the USSR see Stalin as their friend, father, and leader." By Stalin’s 70th birthday in 1949, Khrushchev’s "eulogy" grew even more sycophantic, changing "father" to "biological father": "Glory belongs to Comrade Stalin—the biological father, the wise teacher, and the genius leader of the Party, the Soviet people, and the laborers of the world!"
Yet, in the 1956 "Secret Report" following Stalin’s death, Khrushchev branded Stalin a "tyrant," "executioner," and "inhumane." While Stalin certainly bears important, even primary, leadership responsibility for the excessive expansion of the Purges [44] in those years, Khrushchev and others bear important, even primary, direct responsibility for that expansion, at least in their pursuit of personal credit and rewards. In 1937, while serving as the First Secretary of the Moscow City Committee, Khrushchev called the Moscow Internal Affairs Bureau daily to urge more arrests, saying: "Moscow is the capital; it cannot lag behind Kaluga or Ryazan." He also stated, "We must eliminate these scoundrels... we must do it without a trembling hand, stepping over the corpses of the enemy for the sake of the people's interests." By the end of 1937, 35 out of 38 secretaries of the Moscow Regional and City Committees had been purged, and 136 out of 146 district and city secretaries had been arrested. Russian historian Yuri Zhukov verified in the Soviet archives that during his tenure in Moscow, Khrushchev approved the execution of 8,500 people; after transferring to Ukraine, he requested the execution or imprisonment of another 30,000. Even more unimaginable is that after taking power, Khrushchev used his authority to direct his confidants to destroy documents and materials regarding his own participation in the repressions—materials filling as many as 11 paper bags. While Khrushchev went to extremes to whitewash himself, he went to equal extremes to blacken Stalin’s name. In 1937, based on shifts in the objective situation, Stalin noted that our "victories will be greater, but the remnants of the defeated exploiting classes will also become more vicious, and they will adopt sharper forms of struggle." Here, Stalin spoke of "remnants of the exploiting classes" and "sharper forms of struggle," yet Khrushchev distorted this into the absurd theory that Stalin proposed "the closer we get to socialism, the more enemies there are" and "class struggle will increasingly intensify." Many people failed to check Stalin’s original text and instead propagated the poisoned seeds of Khrushchev’s fabrications.
Gorbachev was likewise a conspirator. At the April 1985 Plenum of the CPSU Central Committee, he vowed solemnly that Lenin’s teachings "were, are, and will remain for us a guide to action, a source of inspiration, and a reliable compass for determining our strategy and tactics for advancement." Subsequently, on various occasions and at different times, he deliberately expressed his loyalty to Lenin. In his 1987 book Perestroika and New Thinking, Gorbachev felt compelled to say: "The works of V.I. Lenin and Lenin's socialist ideas remain for us an inexhaustible source of dialectical creative thought, theoretical wealth, and political foresight"; "Lenin continues to live in the hearts of hundreds of millions." He further stated: "We measure all achievements and errors by the yardstick of socialism. Anyone hoping we will abandon the socialist path will be deeply disappointed." Yet at that very moment, he was using Lenin to strike at Stalin, claiming everything he did was to restore Leninist principles and traditions. Gorbachev’s aide, Vadim Zagladin, noted: "At that time, Gorbachev could not speak the truth openly; he knew the majority of the Politburo and the Central Committee did not support his position. Gorbachev admitted this himself. He had to become somewhat like a 'cunning fox,' unable to say everything, sometimes saying one thing while doing another." Gorbachev acted exactly thus. By the 28th Congress of the CPSU in July 1990, Gorbachev believed the time was ripe; he ceased emphasizing the guiding role of Marxism-Leninism, stressing instead the need to break away from "dogmatic interpretations" and pursue its "creative development." In reality, what Gorbachev continuously enriched and perfected was his so-called "humane, democratic socialism" founded on abstract humanism—a theory that, in essence, was nothing more than an attack on Marxism-Leninism as being neither humane nor democratic.
The transition from extreme individualism to ultimately sinking into the role of an ambitious careerist and conspirator is never merely an expression of trivial personal desires; it is also the political representation of a specific, decayed class and its ideological tendencies. Lu Xun [45] once said that "trickery has its techniques and its effects, but these are limited." Throughout history, in China and abroad, all careerists and conspirators who betray the people have been or will be nailed to the pillar of historical shame. This is the confidence of our history and our people—a confidence as calm, natural, resilient, and firm as the sun and moon traversing the sky or the rivers flowing across the earth.
Shortly before the collapse of the CPSU, a survey conducted by relevant institutions showed that 85% of people believed the CPSU primarily represented the interests of bureaucrats, cadres, and administrative staff. When the CPSU ceased to be the vanguard of the Soviet working class and the representative of the interests of the Soviet people, it is understandable that CPSU members did not stand up to defend the interests of the Party and the state, but instead looked on with indifference as the CPSU moved toward its demise.
(II) A Brief Analysis and Critique of Twelve Other Viewpoints on the Causes of the Demise of the Soviet Party and State
In the thirty years since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, political and academic circles in China and abroad have explored the causes of the CPSU’s demise and the Soviet collapse from multiple perspectives and dimensions. Theories abound and conclusions vary, with more than 50 distinct arguments identified. Here, we analyze the following twelve:
1. The "Original Sin of the October Revolution" Theory Some so-called scholars argue that the October Revolution was a forcibly manufactured revolution—not only a "premature birth" but one imbued with "original sin" from the day it began. The essence of this view is to question and negate the historical necessity of the Russian October Socialist Revolution and the historical legitimacy of the existence and development of Soviet socialism. In fact, the October Revolution was by no means a revolution "manufactured" by the Bolsheviks as some with ulterior motives claim; rather, it was the product of exceptionally sharp social class contradictions in Russia and the maturation of objective and subjective revolutionary conditions. It was the result of the Russian people’s active choice under the guidance of Leninism—it was the choice of history and the choice of the people.
2. The "Stagnation of the Stalin Model" Theory Some scholars attribute the primary cause of the Soviet collapse to the "Stalin model." In their view, the highly centralized political and economic system formed during the Stalin era severely stifled the vitality of Soviet socialism, hindered the realization of socialism's superiority, and ultimately led to the demise of the Party and state. This view exaggerates the problems of the Stalin model and its role in the Soviet collapse, confuses the superiority of the socialist system with specific flaws in institutional mechanisms, and negates the historical achievements and socialist nature of the Stalin model. On one hand, socialist practice during the Stalin period achieved great success, and the highly centralized system played a massive role; on the other hand, the problems within the original Soviet institutional mechanisms merely demonstrated the necessity of reform—they did not mean the demise of the Party and state was inevitable. Some scholars holding this view intend to totally negate the Soviet socialist system to absolve Gorbachev of his guilt.
3. The "Ethnic Conflict as Decisive Factor" Theory Some scholars argue that the principle of national self-determination and the federal state structure proposed by Lenin strengthened ethnic consciousness and sentiment, while the Soviet Constitution's provision for the right of republics to secede laid the groundwork for the collapse. Putin also holds that Lenin’s idea of ethnic autonomy gave republics the right to leave the USSR, which eventually led to the collapse: "It was like a nuclear bomb placed under the 'Russia' building, and later the bomb exploded." He further considers this "Lenin’s greatest mistake" and asserts that "Leninist principles of state-building were not just a mistake—they were worse than a mistake." The implication is that the collapse began with Lenin's ideas and the loophole in the Constitution.
These views do not align with the facts. First, the basic spirit of Lenin’s thought on national self-determination was to protect the rights of oppressed nations and oppose the imposition of the will of large nations—especially the Russian nation—on smaller ones. During the October Revolution, it was precisely through the slogan of national self-determination that the Bolshevik Party supported the national liberation struggles of non-Russian peoples against the Tsarist autocracy and created the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic. Building on this, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was formed in 1922 on a voluntary basis. The 1924 Soviet Constitution affirmed that the "Union is a voluntary association of equal peoples" and stipulated in Article 4 that "each Union Republic retains the right to freely secede from the Union." This was based on the right of self-determination and historical facts, and it was also intended to prevent the resurgence of Great Russian chauvinism [46] from undermining the new Union state.
Second, during the Stalin era, as well as under Khrushchev and Brezhnev, although many contradictions and frictions existed between ethnic groups—and at times became quite sharp—overall, there was unity, friendship, and centripetal force. The West only disputed the sovereignty of the three Baltic states annexed in 1940; it recognized the USSR as formed in 1922. Finally, the intensification of ethnic conflict and the centrifugal tendencies of the republics occurred during the Gorbachev period. This was caused by Gorbachev’s erroneous reforms and ethnic policies. Because the fundamental bonds of unity—the CPSU, Marxism, and socialism—were dismantled by the Gorbachev leadership, the ideological, political, and economic foundations of the Union were completely destroyed. In this context, ethnic separatist forces utilized the "name of the people" and the constitutional right of secession to openly dismantle the Soviet Union. In fact, the Soviet Constitution also contained basic principles for maintaining ethnic unity and the integrity of the Union state, but these were brushed aside by Gorbachev and separatist forces.
4. The "Military Arms Race as Drain" Theory
Some scholars attribute the Soviet collapse to the arms race between the Soviet Union and the United States, arguing that it increased the burden on the Soviet people and exacerbated domestic contradictions. This, they claim, led to economic exhaustion and failing national strength, eventually dragging the Soviet Union down. While the arms race with Western military blocs did indeed bring certain difficulties to Soviet economic and social development, this generally falls under the category of national strategy. It could have been addressed by adjusting strategic objectives and reducing military expenditures to ensure that military strength remained consistent with the level of national economic development and that national defense construction did not exceed the endurance of human and financial resources. In fact, by the Gorbachev era, the Soviet Union had completely abandoned the strategy of hegemony against the U.S. and other Western military blocs and had fully withdrawn its troops from Eastern Europe and elsewhere. Ceasing the arms race did not save the Soviet Union from its fate of collapse.
5. The "Economic Failure Theory"
Some scholars ignore the immense achievements the Soviet Union made over the long term in developing the economy and improving the people's standard of living. Instead, they one-sidedly attribute the Soviet collapse to the socialist economic system, arguing that a rigid economic structure led to stagnation and low living standards. This perspective fails to recognize that the Soviet economy only experienced a slowdown in growth after the mid-1970s; even in the early days of Gorbachev's administration, the growth rate remained no lower than 2%. The severe economic recession and collapse occurred during the latter part of Gorbachev's rule—specifically, negative growth began in 1989, and by 1991, the negative growth rate had reached 13%. This was clearly not caused by a "rigid" Soviet economic system, but was rather a severe consequence of Gorbachev's erroneous reform line, including his flawed economic reform policies.
6. The "Communist Utopia Theory"
This view attributes the Soviet collapse to the guiding ideology of the CPSU [47], arguing that communism is an unachievable "utopia" and that the Soviet Union was therefore destined to fall. This argument was primarily put forward by Gorbachev and Western anti-communist forces. It fundamentally denies that communism is the objective of the scientific Marxist worldview and the trend of human social development. Instead, it views the dissolution of the Soviet Union as the abandonment of a communist "utopia" and a return to a "normal society."
7. The "Abandoned by the People Theory"
Some scholars believe that the masses’ distrust of the CPSU caused it to lose its governing legitimacy, which was the primary reason for its loss of power. In reality, the Soviet people's abandonment of the CPSU was the result of the degeneration of the leadership groups from Khrushchev to Gorbachev, rather than the cause of the Party's demise and the dissolution of the state. One must recognize the nature of the CPSU during the Gorbachev period: although the name remained the same, it was no longer the original CPSU that believed in Marxism-Leninism. Instead, it was a CPSU that believed in so-called "humanistic, democratic socialism." By this time, the CPSU had essentially become a social democratic party that represented only the interests of a tiny minority rather than the fundamental interests of the broad Soviet masses. Its abandonment by the people was entirely logical. The ideological and political degeneration of the leadership groups from Khrushchev to Gorbachev is the fundamental cause of the Party and state’s demise; such a party being eventually discarded by the people is an inevitable outcome. When analyzing the fundamental cause, one must not mistake the effect for the cause.
8. The "External Factors Decisive Theory"
Some scholars view the long-term "peaceful evolution" [48] strategy pursued by Western hostile forces, led by the United States, as the fundamental cause of the Soviet collapse. This view one-sidedly emphasizes the role of external factors, ignoring that external factors act through internal ones. Without the betrayal and cooperation of high-ranking figures within the CPSU represented by Gorbachev, and without the fuel added by the "democratic" separatist forces in Soviet society represented by Yeltsin, the Western strategy of peaceful evolution could not have been realized.
9. The "One-Party Dictatorship Theory"
Some scholars argue that the true cause of the CPSU’s fall and the Soviet collapse was the Party’s long-term one-party rule and monopoly on political power. This view completely turns black into white. During its nearly 70 years of long-term governance, the CPSU did not suffer the tragedy of losing the Party or the state. On the contrary, it was during the Gorbachev period—through the constitutional abolition of the CPSU's governing status and the promotion of a multi-party system, the separation of powers, parliamentary democracy, and a presidential system—that the demise of the Party and state was finally triggered.
10. The "Gorbachev as Traitor Total Responsibility Theory"
Some people attribute the entire responsibility for the demise of the Soviet Party and state to Gorbachev alone, arguing that the dissolution was not a historical necessity but was fundamentally caused by the emergence of Gorbachev as a traitor to Marxism, socialism, communism, and the fundamental interests of the masses. This does not conform to the basic viewpoints of historical materialism; it also objectively exculpates the leadership groups of Khrushchev and Brezhnev from the responsibility they should bear. Engels clearly pointed out: "The main characters were representatives of certain classes and tendencies, and thus of certain ideas of their time, whose motives did not spring from petty personal desires, but from the very historical currents in which they were placed." Once the Khrushchev leadership group totally negated Stalin and began to deviate and detach from the soil of Marxism, socialism, communism, and the fundamental interests of the masses, it became inevitable, in a certain sense, that the "seedlings" of a traitorous leadership group like Gorbachev's would grow and bear this poisonous fruit. Under the historical conditions of the time, even if Gorbachev had not appeared, a similar figure would have emerged.
11. The "Soviet Collapse as Progress Theory"
Some scholars, standing entirely on the side of Western hostile forces, ignore the disastrous consequences the Soviet collapse brought upon the Russian people and the world. Instead, they regard the dissolution as a "historical progression," claiming it allowed the Soviet Union to escape "historical error" and return to the "correct track of civilizational development." Other scholars believe the collapse eased the military pressure on China and improved its security environment. This view only sees individual aspects of the impact; it fails to comprehensively analyze the harm of the Soviet collapse from the perspective of world socialism and the cause of human progress. Even regarding Sino-Soviet relations, there was the possibility of the Soviet Union correcting its errors and returning relations to the correct track—the history of interactions between socialist states fully illustrates this. Moreover, after Gorbachev took office, Sino-Soviet relations already showed signs of easing. It is easy to see that resolving the contradictions and conflicts between China and the Soviet Union and eliminating the threat from the north did not need to come at the cost of the CPSU’s demise and the state’s dissolution.
12. The "Combined Force of Various Elements Theory"
Some scholars believe that the Soviet collapse was not the result of a single factor, but the combined effect of multiple interacting factors. This "combined force" theory synthesizes various causes and has its merits and reasonable points. However, it is far from enough to stop at a list of various factors without distinguishing between primary and secondary ones. We must deeply analyze the most important, decisive factor—namely, the primary contradiction, especially the "principal aspect of the contradiction" [49] and its transformation. The qualitative character of any thing is determined by its internal primary contradiction, especially the principal aspect thereof. Of course, we must also further study what the "adhesive" was that formed these various factors into a "combined force." Originally, the CPSU and the Soviet Union were dominated by a Marxist leadership group with Lenin and Stalin at its core; later, this gradually evolved into a dominance by a revisionist leadership group with Khrushchev and eventually Gorbachev at its core. This is the essence of why the CPSU collapsed and the Soviet Union dissolved.
As academic research, the exploration of the "fundamental causes of the demise of the Soviet Party and state" must adhere to the "Double Hundred" policy [50], revealing the truth and gradually forming a consensus through solid and arduous research. At the same time, the investigation of "causes" has never been a purely academic issue. Especially when historical nihilism [51] is rampant, a prominent manifestation is the use of negating and distorting CPSU history—and totally negating Stalin or even attacking Lenin—as a means to attack the Communist Party of China and smear the historical choices of the Chinese people, as well as to insinuate against, attack, and negate Mao Zedong, the great leader recognized by the Chinese people. "Hitler, Stalin, and Mao Zedong are the three great demons of the 20th century" or "The transition from 'learning from the West' to 'taking Russia as a teacher' [52] was a departure from the mainstream of human civilization"—while the surface appearance of these once-popular "political labels" has indeed changed since the 18th Party Congress [53], we must remain highly vigilant against the practice of conveying political demands through academic discourse. Regarding the major principles of right and wrong involved in interpreting the causes of the Soviet collapse, we must take a clear-cut stand in maintaining the correct political position. If we cannot reach accurate and scientific conclusions regarding the fundamental causes of the Soviet demise, it could directly or indirectly impact and shake the origins and foundations of our CPC and the socialist People's Republic of China. (To be continued)
(Project: This article is a staged result of the National Social Science Fund's special entrusted research project "New Changes in Capitalism, the Essence and Development Trends of Imperialism, and Our Strategic Response.") (Project leader: Li Shenming, Honorary Dean of the School of Politics and Public Management at Zhengzhou University and Director of the World Socialism Research Center of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences) (Project members: Liu Shulin, Wang Tingyou, Li Ruiqin, Zhang Shuhua, Fan Jianxin, Zhao Dingqi) Source: World Socialism Studies, Issue 9