The Soviet Union began to slowly collapse in 1990, and in 1991 the country's fall accelerated rapidly with the Soviet Union disbanding on Christmas Eve 1991.

For those who lived through it, I have some questions:

1) Without hindsight, say, back in January 1990, could you imagine the USSR would no longer exist a year later?

2) Did you view the Cold War as being over in 1990-1991 prior to the USSR falling apart?

3) What do you remember feeling when you heard that the Soviet Union had disbanded?

4) Was there any tension or anxiety that the Soviet Union's collapse would mean international instability or even war between the U.S. and Russia?

The Soviet Union began to slowly collapse in 1990, and in 1991 the country's fall accelerated rapidly with the Soviet Union disbanding on Christmas Eve 1991.

For those who lived through it, I have some questions:

1) Without hindsight, say, back in January 1990, could you imagine the USSR would no longer exist a year later?

2) Did you view the Cold War as being over in 1990-1991 prior to the USSR falling apart?

3) What do you remember feeling when you heard that the Soviet Union had disbanded?

4) Was there any tension or anxiety that the Soviet Union's collapse would mean international instability or even war between the U.S. and Russia?


1) Maybe.  Poland bailed from the Warsaw pact, East German civilians stormed the Stasi HQ.  Good start, but taking down the mothership itself?  Imagining the USSR would fall was a hopeful pipe dream.  (I was young, dumb, and wrong because I was too cynical.)

"I saw the decade end when it seemed the world could change in the blink of an eye."

2) More or less, yes.  (I was young, dumb, and wrong because I was too optimistic.)

"And if anything, then there's your sign of the times."

3) Triumph of democracy and capitalism, end of commie mutant ninja totalitarianism.  Red China would be next despite the setback at Tiananmen Square.  (I was young, dumb, and, well, half-right.  Chinese commies rebranded capitalism as "Capitalism with Red Chinese Characteristics!" which gave them the benefits of capitalism without the pesky "accountability to the people" that comes with actual democracy.  It took 20 years, but it turns out you can have economic growith under totalitarianism.  Back in the 80s-90s, nobody had really tried it at scale before: you could have capitalism and economic growth but you'd have to deal with elections, or you could have a centrally-planned economy and stay in power for 50-75 years as long as you were willing to put a few million in jail to prevent uprisings that came with the famines that killed tens of millions viz. Russian Holodomor, and Chinese famines during the Great Leap Forward.

"I was alive and I waited, waited."

4) Nope.  Insane optimism.  The prevailing sentiment was that if we're not going to bomb each other over economics (capitalism vs. communism), we could all cut back a bit on defense spending and use the surplus to raise the planetary standing of living.  (We were young, dumb, and hopelessly naive.)

"I was alive and I waited for this."

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This video is from a 1990 pop act: Right Here, Right Now (Jesus Jones song) and perfectly encapsulates the misguided optimism of 25 years ago.

Turns out the real battle was between democracies and authoritarian states, and to put it bluntly, the western democracies lost.  3 for 3.  Russia turned into a kleptocracy, China adopted capitalism while retaining dictatorship, and the US is now a Russian vassal state.

But you should listen to that track from 1990, and imagine what it might have been like to be young, dumb, and to feel like you were on the winning side of a struggle that began a generation before you were born.

And you can point at me and laugh for taking that track seriously -- for a KGB officer who was involved in a certain kerfuffle in East Berlin will soon be meeting with one of his former co-workers' assets, one they've cultivated for 30 years: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/07/trump-putin-russia-collusion.html

(With hindsight, I was young, dumb, and wrong because I wasn't cynical enough.  I was alive and I waited for this?!?!  :)

I was pretty much in a bubble at the time and didn't know what was going on in the outside world.

I was in Greece in 1989. Our t.v. were two VCRs-and one of those broke. We had 12 movies per month and those movies got old REAL FAST. I started purchasing my own movies-and people lent/borrowed movies from each other.

The irony of it was the fact that I was actually in Germany in Nov. 1989 (Wiesbaden) and didn't even have a clue as to what was going on in Berlin (the wall coming down). I got back to the States at the end of Nov. that year and moved to a mountain where I didn't get any t.v. (Days before satellite t.v.) where I lived for about 2 years. I received most of my news from magazines and they were usually old news.

The world was changing and I didn't even know.


Cat