Could the Soviet Union return? Over the weekend it has become clearer that Vladimir Putin is determined to revive Russia’s past power. Is this possible in the digital age?
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'Back to the USSR': nightmare behind war
Could the Soviet Union return? Over the weekend it has become clearer that Vladimir Putin is determined to revive Russia's past power. Is this possible in the digital age?
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On 25 December 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev, the leader of the Soviet Union, addressed the people of this vast empire for the last time: "We are now living in a new world".
Overnight, a superpower spanning 22.4 million square km and counting 290 million citizens disappeared. The Cold War was over.
Thirty years later, history has come crashing back. On Thursday morning, Russian president Vladimir Putin ordered his tanks to attack Ukraine. By Saturday, missiles were hitting the capital of Kyiv. Yesterday, fighting broke out in the streets of Ukraine's second city, Kharkiv. Now, some think that Putin will not stop until the USSR is back on the map.
The Soviet Union was founded in 1917 by a group of revolutionaries. They wanted to overthrow the Tsars and create a new state where wealth was shared.
Things did not quite turn out that way. Led by Vladimir Lenin and his successor Joseph Stalin, the USSR committed numerous atrocities.
The KGB spied on Soviet citizens. Dissenters were killed or sentenced to work in labour camps. Between August 1936 and March 1938, Stalin executed up to 1.2 million political opponents and ethnic minorities.
Poverty was everywhere. Famine killed millions.
Many breathed a sigh of relief when the USSR collapsed. Yet today, the USSR is popular among Russians. A 2020 poll found that 75% consider it to be the "greatest time" in their country's history.
But it might be difficult to bring back the USSR today. The Iron Curtain was almost impermeable. Soviet citizens were kept ignorant of life outside. It is difficult to achieve such isolation in the internet age, where anything can be filmed and broadcast globally.
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<h5><span data-preserver-spaces="true">Could the Soviet Union return?</span></h5>
Yes: Putin will not call his state the Soviet Union. But his invasion of Ukraine and recent aggressive behaviour towards ex-Soviet neighbours shows he is hungry for a new Russian empire.
No: The Soviets were revolutionaries. They sought to free people from tyranny and inequality. Putin's state has no noble ambitions whatsoever.
Or... Russia is badly run and becoming irrelevant on the global stage. Even if a new Soviet Union arises, it will be a mere shadow of what it used to be and could crumble quickly.
Soviet Union - Officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). A powerful group of communist republics, the biggest being Russia, that existed from 1922 to 1991.
Kharkiv - Ukraine's second-largest city. Before the war, it had a population of 1.5 million.
Iron Curtain - A political, military and ideological barrier dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War Two until the end of the Cold War in 1991.
‘Back to the USSR’: nightmare behind war
Glossary
Soviet Union - Officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). A powerful group of communist republics, the biggest being Russia, that existed from 1922 to 1991.
Kharkiv - Ukraine’s second-largest city. Before the war, it had a population of 1.5 million.
Iron Curtain - A political, military and ideological barrier dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War Two until the end of the Cold War in 1991.