In 1917 Russia went through two revolutions. The first overthrew the tsarist government. In the second, the Bolshevik party led workers and peasants
to revolution under the slogan of: "All power to the Soviets".
In post-revolutionary Russia, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was established. Also known as the Soviet Union, the new communist country was the successor to the Russian Empire and the first country in the world based on Marxist socialism. The Soviet Union grew into one of the world's most powerful and influential countries, encompassing 15 republics.
Gorbachev created perestroika (economic restructuring), and glasnost (freedom of speech). The perestroika and glasnost had repercussions.
One was the creation of the black market. Afterwards, food was easier to find, but expensive. When food became too expensive people made Dachas,
small plots of land with edible plants. Dachas were hidden to prevent others from stealing the food.
With the black market came organized crime.
The USSR had a weak economy. Necessities became hard to find. Some, called chelnokis, rode trains as far as china to buy goods. They returned, with their striped bags, and sold goods for profit.
The perestroika was Gorbachev’s way to change the USSR. Each change brought new problems. Government could not fix the problems. A coup tried to take over the government. It failed. In 1991 Gorbachev resigned as president of the USSR.
Christmas 1991, the Soviet flag flew over the Kremlin for the last time. A few days earlier, representatives from 11 Soviet republics met to
announce they would no longer be part of the Soviet Union. They established a Commonwealth of Independent States. Three Baltic republics had already
declared their independence. Only Georgia remained. The Soviet Union had fallen. It was a peaceful end to a long, terrifying, and sometimes bloody,
epoch in world history.
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