How Ukrainians Were Responsible For The End Of The Cold War

23 August 2016 16:26

Hromadske’s Nataliya Gumenyuk spoke to Serhii Plokhii, Author and Professor of Ukrainian History at Harvard University

What You Need To Know:

✅ Serhii Plokhii dispels the prevailing myth that United States was responsible for the end of the Cold War;

✅ “What my book shows is that none of them (Bush, Reagan) really contributed to the key moments in the end of the Cold War and that is the collapse of the Soviet Union;”

✅ An overwhelming Ukrainian vote supporting independence on December 1st, 1991 was in fact what led to the end of the Soviet Union and in turn, the end of the Cold War;

✅ “Putin’s project of a Eurasian Union is incomplete without the participation of Ukraine.”

Serhii Plokhii, Professor of Ukrainian History at Harvard University and author of ‘The Last Empire: The Final Days of the Soviet Union”, dispels the prevailing myth that United States was responsible for the end of the Cold War. Former United States presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. Bush are often credited with their contributions however Plokhii says otherwise: “What my book shows is that none of them really contributed to the key moments in the end of the Cold War and that is the collapse of the Soviet Union.”

Plokhii says the disintegration of the Soviet Union was never the American aim in the Cold War, but an overwhelming Ukrainian vote supporting independence on December 1st, 1991 was in fact what led to the end of the Soviet Union and in turn, the end of the war. A key element was the “decisiveness of the Ukrainian political leadership and Ukrainian people who said ‘No’ to the last empire on the map of the world.”

While Ukrainians voted not for the disintegration of the Soviet Union but to leave it, Russia refused to support the project after Ukraine was gone. Without the support of Ukraine, the second largest Soviet Republic, the imperial experiment failed, says Plokhii. Today, “Putin’s project of a Eurasian Union is incomplete without the participation of Ukraine,” he adds.

Hromadske’s Nataliya Gumenyuk spoke to Serhii Plokhii, Author and Professor of Ukrainian History at Harvard University in August, 2016.