Ep 22: Fall Of The Soviet Union

If the Soviet Union achieved so much, why did it collapse in 1991?

In this episode we dive into the history of the USSR. From the shockwave of the 1917 revolution, to its the hard won post WWII peak, and then the sudden, violent unspooling of the whole socialist project.

Join Triploi as we follow the chain reaction of the Soviet meltdown, from de‑Stalinization to the threat of thermonuclear war, to the stagnation of the Soviet economy, the war in Afghanistan, the Chernobyl disaster, to the catastrophic misfire of glasnost and perestroika, and how all of it built up to break the Union for good.

And looking back at the faded brutalist concrete of the Soviet Union’s memorials, we reflect on what lessons we may yet learn.

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References and reading list:

• Isaac Deutscher - Russia After Stalin: With a Postscript on the Beria Affair (1953)
• Moshe Lewin - The Gorbachev Phenomenon: A Historical Interpretation (1991)
• David Kotz and Fred Weir - Revolution From Above: The Demise of the Soviet System (1997)
• Stephen F. Cohen - Failed Crusade: America and the Tragedy of Post-Communist Russia (2001)
• Samir Amin - The Future of Maoism (1983)
• Michael Parenti - Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism (1997)
• John Perkins - Confessions of an Economic Hit Man (2004)
• Max Hastings - Inferno: The World at War, 1939–1945 (2011)