contents
For some, Gorbachev was the embodiment of change and progress, for others he was the gravedigger of an empire and a destroyer of jobs. No one before and after him at the controls of power in Moscow divided opinions like Mikhail Gorbachev.
In Russia, his supporters have been in the minority since his resignation in 1991. In the West, on the other hand, the perception was completely different and Gorbachev was not only awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, but also associated with him the hope of a new beginning after seven decades of Soviet totalitarianism.
His gaze ahead
In Russia, the generation of perestroika and glasnost of the 1980s lost one of its central figures with the death of the 91-year-old. For those who have remained true to the progressive ideals of their youth in Russia, the reformer Gorbachev always stood for an open Russia and thus a Russia, completely contrary to the ideas of the current President Vladimir Putin.
While Putin often looks backwards, Gorbachev always looked to the future during his active years as a politician.
No new and worthy life
Looking back, his words about leaving power more than 30 years ago sound desperate given the current situation. At that time, Gorbachev addressed his words to the former citizens of the Soviet Union who had been living in Russia for a few months. “It now depends on all of us and on each individual that our civilization awakens to a new and dignified life.”
Russia, as the successor state of the Soviet Union, has not succeeded in this awakening since then. With Vladimir Putin’s major attack on Ukraine in February 2022, the hope of such an awakening and of a dignified life for decades to come seems completely excluded.
dealing with unpleasantness
Gorbachev may have developed into a domestic political flyweight in recent years, and yet his fate reflects the fate of millions of residents of the Soviet Union. Born into a poor peasant family, there were victims of Stalinist repression in his immediate family circle. A childhood that a glorified view of the Soviet Union later seemed to have made impossible for him.
It is this awareness of one’s own fallibility that the current Russian government completely eludes. In recent years, Vladimir Putin has made it impossible to critically examine his own past, knowing full well that critical questions about past governments could lead to critical questions about the current government.
burial of hope
With the 91-year-old Mikhail Gorbachev, not only is the first and last President of the Soviet Union buried, but also the hope of all those who hoped for real change after the end of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Gorbachev’s silence on Vladimir Putin’s large-scale attack on Ukraine can no longer be accused of complicity. His opponents and supporters in Russia are unlikely to shake hands in reconciliation over his grave. Foreign guests are unlikely to make the cumbersome journey to today’s isolated Russia. Despite all the support in the West for his policies of the past.