Page 72 - Gorbachev News Today

Legal constraints on your missile defense systems. and we said 400 times were not going to sign an agreement with legal constraints on our missile defenses, even though we werent planning to deploy missile defenses that could repel a russian attack. this reminds me of max mist positions that suggest today, if you read the tea leaves, that maybe theres room for compromise if we sit down and have a giant negotiation, but a negotiation that if its real, its going to take years to accomplish, not ju...

Because hes seen it bring down a giant before. >> the symbol of the soviet union, fluttered down in a freezing moscow wind christmas night. nothing will ever be the same. >> when the soviet union was teetering on the edge of collapse -- >> gorbachev has destroyed the whole country. >> many of its republics demanded independence. >> the delicate fabric holding together the variety of ethnics republics in the soviet union is unraveling. >> one by one, those republics -- >> estonia, lithuania, mole...

Caused this to become a kind of urgent crisis with russia amassing more than 100,000 troops on the ukrainian border? has something changed very recently? >> well, you know, it started in the beginning of the 90s. when germany was reunited and when the then soviet union and soviet union leader mr. gorbachev said okay to that, there was a promise by the american side. unfortunately not fixed in a judicial legally binding guaranteed document, but there was a guarantee that nato would never -- would...

To ann applebaum. she reports on autocratic leaders from hungary to turkey to poland. >> one of the strangest things for me in my career has been the sudden realization that these are exactly the kind of things that you see very often in other parts of the world. >> the number of countries where democracy is failing or autocracy growing is now the highest it has been since the end of the cold war. one reason why? >> during the cold war, the united states presented itself as the leader of the dem...

Being talked about, the russian demands, the draft negotiations, these issues have been around for a few years. what has happened in the last few months or few weeks that has caused this to become a kind of urgent crisis with russia amassing more than 100,000 troops on the ukrainian border? has something changed very recently? >> well, you know, it started in the beginning of the 90s. when germany was reunited and when the then soviet union and soviet union leader mr. gorbachev said okay to that...

Mmp say who does it benefit? it tries to ramp up the support for the government in ukraine at this moment in time. and, to undermine its own opposition, because the russian opposition, because the russian opposition bloc has been under attack, the leader under house arrest at the moment, even. let attack, the leader under house arrest at the moment, even. let slip to the russian _ arrest at the moment, even. let slip to the russian side, _ arrest at the moment, even. let slip to the russian side...

Leaders from hungary to turkey to poland. >> one of the strangest things for me in my career has been the sudden realization that these are exactly the kind of things that you see very often in other parts of the world. >> the number of countries where democracy is failing or autocracy growing is now the highest it has been since the end of the cold war. one reason why? >> during the cold war, the united states presented itself as the leader of the democratic camp. >> mr. gorbachev, tear down th...

After the fall of the soviet union. but its a highly disputed history and there is no question that the west pressed its advantage. george h. w. bush, you know, wanted not only wanted to reunite germany, but he also realized that there were countries in eastern europe, in the baltic states, that had historical reasons for wanting to be in nato. security reasons. russia, obviously, was in a position of weakness. and right now, putin seeks to reverse what he sees us the disastrous negotiations by ...

Tuckman book about the way nations creep toward war. but i think the central figure here, and the person most at fault, singularly at fault for arousing it is vladimir putin. he is holding a nation hostage. a democratic nation that troubles him. because he is angry, in retrospect, about the past. he wants to set out to prove to his own people that gorbachev was too weak with the west and communist ideology. he wants to prove that boris was too weak. he is going to rearrange the security arrangem...

Secession. to the liberal reformer gorbachev russian leaders have regarded ukraine as fundamentally tied to moscow. ukraines first two presidents while asserting the countrys newfound independence were careful not to break too sharply with moscow. according to a census conducted in 2001 almost 30% of the countrys population spoke russian as their first language. putins dilemma is that ukraine is in slow motion escaping russias grasp. in the last decade the country has become more independent, de...