Fall of the Soviet Union

During the 1980s President Ronald Reagan of the United States isolated the Soviet economy by driving oil prices to their lowest levels in decades, and embarking on an arms race that ultimately bankrupted the communist regime.  Reading the writing on the wall, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev introduced a glasnost plan calling for political openness.  The plan eliminated any residue of Stalinist repression.  Perestroika restructured the economy, creating a hybrid communist-capitalist system.  As this was occurring, the Soviet Union was losing its grip on its Eastern European satellites.  In 1989 a political revolution in Poland and the toppling of the Berlin Wall spelled the beginning of the end of the USSR.  Communist Party hard-liners attempted a coup in August of 1991, which was unsuccessful.  By the end of the year Gorbachev resigned as leader of the USSR, and a week later the Soviet Union officially ceased to exist.