Soviet Union (Pearlism World)

The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is the Largest Country in Eurasia. it is a Socialist Republic that was Communist from 1922-1991. The Republic is Lead by Mikhail Gorbachev who was been in power since 1985.

Unification of the Soviet Republics
On 28 December 1922, a conference of plenipotentiary delegations from the Russian SFSR, the Transcaucasian SFSR, the Ukrainian SSR and theByelorussian SSR approved the Treaty of Creation of the USSR[9] and the Declaration of the Creation of the USSR, forming the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.[10] These two documents were confirmed by the 1st Congress of Soviets of the USSR and signed by the heads of the delegations,[11] Mikhail Kalinin, Mikha Tskhakaya, Mikhail Frunze, Grigory Petrovsky, and Aleksandr Chervyakov,[12] on 30 December 1922.

On 1 February 1924, the USSR was recognized by the British Empire. The same year, a Soviet Constitution was approved, legitimizing the December 1922 union.

An intensive restructuring of the economy, industry and politics of the country began in the early days of Soviet power in 1917. A large part of this was done according to the Bolshevik Initial Decrees, government documents signed by Vladimir Lenin. One of the most prominent breakthroughs was theGOELRO plan, which envisioned a major restructuring of the Soviet economy based on total electrification of the country. The plan was developed in 1920 and covered a 10- to 15-year period. It included construction of a network of 30 regional power plants, including ten large hydroelectric power plants, and numerous electric-powered large industrial enterprises.[13] The plan became the prototype for subsequent Five-Year Plans and was basically fulfilled by 1931.[14]

Stalin's rule
Main article: History of the Soviet Union (1927–1953) From its beginning, the government in the Soviet Union was based on the one-party rule of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks).[15] After the economic policy of War Communism during the Civil War, the Soviet government permitted some private enterprise to coexist alongside nationalized industry in the 1920s and total food requisition in the countryside was replaced by a food tax (see New Economic Policy).

Soviet leaders argued that one-party rule was necessary to ensure that "capitalist exploitation" would not return to the Soviet Union and that the principles of Democratic Centralismwould represent the people's will. Debate over the future of the economy provided the background for a power struggle in the years after Lenin's death in 1924. Initially, Lenin was to be replaced by a "troika" consisting of Grigory Zinoviev of Ukraine, Lev Kamenev of Moscow, and Joseph Stalin of Georgia.

On 3 April 1922, Stalin was named the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Lenin had appointed Stalin the head of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate, which gave Stalin considerable power. By gradually consolidating his influence and isolating and out-maneuvering his rivals within the party, Stalin became theundisputed leader of the Soviet Union and, by the end of the 1920s, established totalitarian rule. In October 1927, Grigory Zinoviev and Leon Trotsky were expelled from the Central Committee and forced into exile.

In 1928, Stalin introduced the First Five-Year Plan for building a socialist economy. While encompassing the internationalism expressed by Lenin throughout the course of the Revolution, it also aimed to build socialism in one country. In industry, the state assumed control over all existing enterprises and undertook an intensive program of industrialization. In agriculture, collective farms were established all over the country.

Famines ensued, causing millions of deaths; surviving kulaks were persecuted and many sent to Gulags to do forced labour.[16] Social upheaval continued in the mid-1930s. Stalin'sGreat Purge resulted in the execution or detainment of many "Old Bolsheviks" who had participated in the October Revolution with Lenin. The death toll is uncertain, with a wide range of estimates. According to declassified Soviet archives, in 1937 and 1938, the NKVD arrested more than one and a half million people, of whom 681,692 were shot – an average of 1,000 executions a day.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-16" style="line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; ">[17] The excess deaths during the 1930s as a whole were in the range of 10–11 million.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-1930s_17-0" style="line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; ">[18] Yet despite the turmoil of the mid-to-late 1930s, the Soviet Union developed a powerful industrial economy in the years before World War II.

The 1930s
<p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">The early 1930s saw closer cooperation between the West and the USSR. From 1932 to 1934, the Soviet Union participated in the World Disarmament Conference. In 1933, diplomatic relations between the United States and the USSR were established. In September 1934, the Soviet Union joined the League of Nations. After the Spanish Civil War broke out in 1936, the USSR actively supported the Republican forces against the Nationalists, who were supported by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany.

<p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">In December 1936, Stalin unveiled a new Soviet Constitution. The constitution was seen as a personal triumph for Stalin, who on this occasion was described by Pravda as a "genius of the new world, the wisest man of the epoch, the great leader of communism." By contrast, western historians and historians from former Soviet occupied countries have viewed the constitution as a meaningless propaganda document.

<p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">The late 1930s saw a shift towards the Axis powers. In 1938, after the United Kingdom and France had concluded the Munich Agreement with Germany, the USSR dealt with the Nazis as well, both militarily and economically during extensive talks. The two countries concluded the German–Soviet Nonaggression Pact and the German–Soviet Commercial Agreement. The nonaggression pact made possible Soviet occupation of Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bessarabia, northern Bukovina, and eastern Poland. In late November of the same year, unable to coerce the Republic of Finland by diplomatic means into moving its border 25 kilometres (16 mi) back from Leningrad, Joseph Stalin ordered the invasion of Finland.

<p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">In the east, the Soviet military won several decisive victories during border clashes with the Japanese Empire in 1938 and 1939. However, in April 1941, USSR signed the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact with the Empire of Japan, recognizing the territorial integrity of Manchukuo, a Japanese puppet state.

World War II
Soviet Katyusha multiple rocket launchers fire on Berlin, April 1945.Main article: Eastern Front (World War II) <p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">Although it has been debated whether the Soviet Union had any intention of invading Germany once it was strong enough,<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-18" style="line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; ">[19] Germany itself broke the treaty and invaded the Soviet Union on 22 June 1941, starting what was known in the USSR as the "Great Patriotic War". The Red Army stopped the seemingly-invincible German Army at the Battle of Moscow, aided by an unusually harsh winter. The Battle of Stalingrad, which lasted from late 1942 to early 1943, dealt a severe blow to the Germans from which they never fully recovered and became a turning point of the war. After Stalingrad, Soviet forces drove through Eastern Europe to Berlin before Germany surrendered in 1945.

Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill (left to right) confer in Tehran in 1943. <p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">The same year, the USSR, in fulfillment of its agreement with the Allies at the Yalta Conference, denounced the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact in April 1945<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-denunciation_19-0" style="line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; ">[20] and invaded Manchukuo and other Japan-controlled territories on 9 August 1945.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-declarationofwar_20-0" style="line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; ">[21] This conflict ended with a decisive Soviet victory, contributing to the unconditional surrender of Japan and the end of World War II.

<p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">The Soviet Union suffered greatly in the war, losing around 27 million people.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-21" style="line-height: 1em; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; ">[22] Despite this, it emerged as a military superpower. Once denied diplomatic recognition by the Western world, the Soviet Union had official relations with practically every nation by the late 1940s. A member of the United Nations at its foundation in 1945, the Soviet Union became one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, which gave it the right to veto any of its resolutions (see Soviet Union and the United Nations).

<p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">The Soviet Union maintained its status as one of the world's two superpowers for four decades through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, military strength, economic strength, aid to developing countries, and scientific research, especially in space technology and weaponry.

The Cold War
<p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">Brezhnev's next two successors, transitional figures with deep roots in his tradition, did not last long. Yuri Andropov was 68 years old andKonstantin Chernenko 72 when they assumed power; both died in less than two years. In an attempt to avoid a third short-lived leader, in 1985, the Soviets turned to the next generation and selected Mikhail Gorbachev.

Brezhnev Era
Following the ousting of Khrushchev, another period of collective leadership ensued, consisting of Leonid Brezhnev as General Secretary, Alexei Kosygin as Premier and Nikolai Podgorny as Chairman of the Presidium, lasting until Brezhnev established himself in the early 1970s as the preeminent Soviet leader. In 1968 the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies invaded Czechoslovakia to halt the Prague Spring reforms.

In October 1977, the third Soviet Constitution was unanimously adopted. The prevailing mood of the Soviet leadership at the time of Brezhnev's death in 1982 was one of aversion to change. The long period of Brezhnev's rule had come to be dubbed one of "standstill", with an aging and ossified top political leadership.

Reforms of Gorbachev, the Collapse of the Iron Curtain, and an End to Communism
<p style="margin-top: 0.4em; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0.5em; margin-left: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;">Gorbachev made significant changes in the economy and party leadership. He introduced Perestroika and Glasnost. It took time before the Soviet Union returned to Glory. and with the Union nearly dissolved, Gorbachev had to step up his efforts to reform the Union. In 1988, the Soviet Union abandoned its Nine-Year War in Afghanistan and began to withdraw its forces. On August 16th, 1991, the New Union Treaty was signed by Gorbachev. Temporaily Replacing "Socialist" with "Sovereign" in the USSR's full name. in 1992 however, Leaders voted to bring back the Original name and create a enhanced economy. while maintaing a mainly communist economy, Soviets allowed some people to create wealthy class of soviets but they were taxed heavily. In 1993. Mikhail Gorbachev and US President Bill Clinton signed the first treaty which created their diplomatic relations. Immediatly following the 9/11 Attacks, the United States and Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan toppling and executing leaders of the Taliban. in 2005, Gorbachev Visited the US for the first time. Today the Soviet Union and the United States keep a watchful eye on the world. making sure peace is kept.