I was curious about how Gorbachev, the last Premier of the Soviet Union,
might be thinking regarding Putin's invasion of Ukraine.

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/03/07/putins-bloody-folly-in-ukraine

<quote>
But it was not until Mikhail Gorbachev came to power that a Kremlin
leader opened a true discussion of the past. “Even now, we still
encounter attempts to ignore sensitive questions of our history, to hush
them up,” Gorbachev said, in 1987, in a speech marking the seventieth anniversary of the October Revolution. “We cannot agree to this. It
would be a neglect of historical truth, disrespect for the memory” of
those who were repressed.

That speech proved shrewd and transformative. Gorbachev signalled that
the time had come to examine the history of the Soviet Union, including
the “secret protocols” of Stalin’s pact with Hitler, which paved the way for the annexation of the Baltic states and the brutal subjugation of
Poland. Nearly overnight, Soviet citizens learned how the decisions had
been made to invade Budapest, in 1956, Prague, in 1968, and Kabul, in
1979. One of the watersheds of the Gorbachev era was the creation, in
1989, of Memorial, an organization charged with exploring Soviet history
and its archives and upholding the principles of the rule of law and of
human rights. Putin’s regime, mobilizing against civil society, has
tellingly designated Memorial a “foreign agent” and ordered the group to
be shut down.
</quote>

So let us NOT forget "Gorby the Reformer". When the people got a taste
of FREEDOM with perestroika and glasnost, they wanted MORE. And, so, 30
years ago last December, Gorby stepped down and the Soviet Union became
a bunch of autonomous nations, more or less the way it was before WW1.

<quote>
Putin, who blames Gorbachev for defiling the reputation and the
stability of the Soviet Union, and Boris Yeltsin, the leader who
succeeded him, for catering to the West and failing to hold back the
expansion of NATO, reveres strength above all. If he has to distort
history, he will. As a man who came into his own as an officer of the
K.G.B., he also believes that foreign conspiracy is at the root of all
popular uprisings. In recent years, he has regarded pro-democracy
protests in Kyiv and Moscow as the work of the C.I.A. and the U.S. State Department, and therefore demanding to be crushed. This cruel and
pointless war against Ukraine is an extension of that disposition. Not
for the first time, though, a sense of beleaguerment has proved self-fulfilling. Putin’s assault on a sovereign state has not only
helped to unify the West against him; it has helped to unify Ukraine
itself. What threatens Putin is not Ukrainian arms but Ukrainian
liberty. His invasion amounts to a furious refusal to live with the
contrast between the repressive system he keeps in place at home and the aspirations for liberal democracy across the border.
</quote>

(More in the article)

Russian People: which do you prefer, STALINIST 'Re-build Soviet Union'
PUTIN, or the better sense of reformist Gorbechev, followed by President Yeltsin, *ESPECIALLY* with more freedom and the various other reforms?
(As a TRUE American, MY choice would be FREEDOM, for myself and EVERYONE
ELSE)


--
(aka 'Bombastic Bob' in case you wondered)

'Feeling with my fingers, and thinking with my brain' - me

'your story is so touching, but it sounds just like a lie'
"Straighten up and fly right"

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
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