Moscow's empire - rise and fall (2/4) | DW Documentary

[Applause] once upon a time there was a country the largest in the world in fact it was an empire it was called the Soviet Union shortly before its 70th birthday it vanished from the map trophy Nika [Music] [Music] in the Kremlin in Moscow Mikhail Gorbachev was starting to realize the Soviet Union was falling apart [Music] Gorbachev couldn't stop this process it was turning out differently from the way he'd expected and was taking on a life of its own I don't believe that he intended the Soviet Union to disintegrate the Soviet Union fell apart mainly because the Baltic republics wanted to leave when they left everyone else saw that it could be done and wanted to do it too daughters were lawful food why did the Soviet Union collapse what reunited Germany was it Gorbachev soft approach or Reagan's hardline Gorbachev's approach was important but without Reagan's policies there would have been no Gorbachev mr. Gorbachev open this gate Yana the truth is the Soviet Union lost because the US was so intractable the gates were opened the Berlin Wall fell and Moscow's empire contracted at a breathtaking pace on the international stage Gorbachev ended on a high note in the two plus four treaties the Soviet Union relinquished East Germany and paved the way for a new European order Europeans in general but especially the East and West Germans were grateful to him the era of the Soviet Union as a superpower ended with the reunification of the two Germany's [Music] the retreat began Moscow pulled 500,000 Soviet soldiers out of East Germany alone [Music] the group of Soviet armed forces in Germany was the largest permanent army ever stationed by an occupation force abroad the logistics needed to get them back home were just as fast Poland had also broken with Moscow so most of the troops left Germany via the ferry part of Makran and the Baltic island of rügen observers followed the huge enterprise with great interest nobody knew exactly what weapons the Soviet Army had kept in East Germany [Music] as far if you had to keep there were a lot of hazardous materials we kept note of everything so you could almost piece it together these were munitions those were special in Russian rail cars which were somewhat larger than normal but enclosed and when they pass through then you knew either there was a rocket inside or maybe there wasn't the Soviet withdrawal gave Luke Rahn a much-needed boost as one of East Germany's last big transportation projects the port had been built specifically for trade with the Soviet Union and the collapse of comecon and left it largely idle [Music] that's the end tidal fear yoga MOOC on when they decided to use the MOOC run very important forty three percent in other words almost half of the military transports to the Soviet Union it had an enormous significance for the port especially for the railway workers and ship crews they had work again there was something to do and the ships were turning around in an unbroken 48 hour cycle to transport this huge military machine back to the east to transport young they really tried to paint it as a proud army leaving Germany with its head high the first time I was standing on the pier at the port the reality actually looks different it was nothing left of what we in West Germany had learnt about the super power they were just young men in uniforms who were much too thin they obviously hadn't been getting much food their cheekbones stood out sharply and looking at some of those guys you really thought they belong with our mothers not in the army in the army the word went out at Soviet army bases across the country everything can go of course it wasn't official but under the counter in good old socialist style the Deutsche Mark had been introduced into the former East Germany and banknotes were easier to transport than equipment advice I know it was going on you said ok a Kalashnikov you can get one for a hundred marks so the soldiers were facing a journey into the unknown the Soviet Union they had come from was disintegrating on August 31st 1994 the Soviet troop withdrawal was complete Germany paid about fifteen billion darks to cover its cost but the price that Moscow paid was far greater until then the heroic Soviet Army had been seen as a symbol of the Empire's power and grandeur emotionally it was seen as the defeat really I'm telling you a defeat not only did I understand it that way but also the bulk of the population did was just for miscellanea the empire wasn't only disintegrating at its edges it was also tearing itself apart internally Mikhail Gorbachev had wanted to give the Republic's more autonomy in the summer of 1991 orthodox communists including the soviet union's own Minister of Defense mounted a coup against Gorbachev surrounding the Russian parliament with tanks citizens turned down to stop them [Music] the coup plotters held Gorbachev captive for three days and his holiday home in Crimea the country was dissolving as were the values that had held it together the army a shared ideology and solidarity in a video interview Gorbachev refused to declare a state of emergency and thereby recognized the cool the newly elected president of the Russian socialist Soviet republic Boris Yeltsin went out and managed to persuade the insurgents to return to their barracks his success made him the new strongman in Moscow and he lost no time in upping the ante he undermined Gorbachev in public interrupted him during a speech to Parliament on August 23rd 1991 and treated him like a child and then to cap it all he did something nobody had expected listen de facto withdrew Russia from the Soviet Union something which nobody even imagined so history sometimes goes above imagination so I think Yeltsin was very important very important figure the end of the Soviet Union was sealed when the heads of state of Russia Ukraine and Belarus signed the agreement establishing the Commonwealth of Independent States or CIS Stanislav Russia cabbage was one of them I had long believed the vision of socialism leading to communism was in itself a good one as long as I lived in the USSR I never ever thought it would cease to exist the newest products when nine other Soviet republics joined the CIS the Soviet Union was practically left as a state without territory is a bulge so even just half an hour before the deal was signed I didn't believe in the end of a Soviet Union soggy sales motifs that's what she stored on December 21st 1991 Mikhail Gorbachev stood down in the end of the soviet union was officially declared the dream of communism was now history [Music] mikhail gorbachev's role in these events is still controversial even now the belief that kovachev did all this because he was such a good person is fundamentally wrong gorbachev made freedom possible . in the soviet union alone he gave freedom to 280 million people taking the whole eastern bloc he gave freedom to around half a billion people whether he did so consciously or unconsciously is another matter but he did something tremendous something historic his policies ensured that a vast number of people emerged from a totalitarian soviet system peacefully and voluntarily we saw that the darkness is jamming the story of the country that wanted to change the world ended just before its 70th birthday one nation was suddenly 15:15 former soviet republics whose national characteristics and antagonisms had been repressed for almost 70 years [Music] now they came to the surface in the Republic of Moldova for example where Moldovans and Russians came into direct conflict the result was a new border within moldova itself which was heavily guarded and could only be crossed with a visa xiv formerly Soviet now Russian army played an important role in its creation it was stationed in the city of Tirisfal and it stayed there in spite of Moldova's declaration of independence the Russians were now foreigners on foreign territory but it only recently been their home the conflict was sparked by a dispute over the official language of the new state Russian the unifying language of the old Soviet Union was to be replaced by Romanian Russian such as Vladimir at Antioch felt discriminated against many interpreted this rebirth of national consciousness in their own way instead of cultivating its culture its uniqueness its roots and its language a repulsive nationalism arose in the republic of moldova this nationalism expressed itself in such a way that people were judged by their origins it's also like that in the Baltic countries there are citizens and non-citizens human beings and sub humans this is exactly what happened here only in a worse way even though 40% of Moldova's population was russian-speaking Parliament passed the new law on languages Romanian was declared the official language Romanian not Moldovan but Romanian the writing changed from Cyrillic to Latin script that meant the majority of the population which did not know the Latin script became practically illiterate stolen drama the confrontation over the official language exploded into violence in the 14th Russian army intervened Transnistria the part of Moldova where it was stationed split off and remained russian-speaking a thousand people died in the fighting along the kneestr in the spring and summer of 1992 peace has now returned but in reality the conflict was only ever put on ice Papa Kuznetsov fought alongside the Russian army the fighting began on March 2nd and four boys were immediately killed this is where they are buried the commander of the battalion is also buried here they attacked the barracks in Cochiti the soldiers their 19 year old boys were outnumbered basically the conflict was artificially blown out of proportion neither they nor we wanted this war but when a war begins every day of fighting sets peace back at least a year the case of Transnistria is just one example of the numerous conflicts that erupted between the peoples of the former Soviet Union the common values of the Soviet years countered for little in those wild times new war memorials constantly joined the old ones often adorned with the red star Russia whose sphere of influence was continually shrinking was always involved [Music] no don't conflict for him one of us Nick if it's an apple I believe that this conflict had entirely different roots motivo Yakubu Devon yes they claimed that the Moldovans wanted to prevent the spread of the Russian language very honest Israel but in truth Moscow wanted to maintain its influence in this important region Brianna no it is after all the Gateway to the Balkans and they wanted to do that at any cost but the Satya if this was too tired transnistria was no isolated case everywhere in the early 1990s regional conflicts flared up and Russia intervened in nearly all of them in Chechnya Georgia and the Caucasus there were microstates for almost the entire male population was under arms and decades and sometimes centuries old conflicts flared up again in Chechnya for instance the Chechens could live with being Soviets but after the Soviet Union's demise they suddenly belonged to Russia and the Chechens had never wanted to be Russian in the first few years following the disintegration of the Soviet Union more than thirty thousand people were killed in violent civil wars this conflict there were many conflicts that we inherited from the Soviet Union I mean the conflicts in Tajikistan Abkhazia South Ossetia and nagorno-karabakh and we had internal fighting in Chechnya there was the Transnistria conflict conflict everywhere in Russia intervened as a peacemaker with the aims of resolving these conflicts It was as if a battered giant like Gulliver gave one side a weapon then provoked the other and gave support to yet another so that they would all fight against each other and the giant looked down from above all so hungry and wounded but yet still stronger than all the rest [Music] it meant the so called dwarves or former Soviet republics have never managed to stand on their own two feet [Music] the small Republic of Moldova remained completely dependent on Russia in the 1990s it was one of Europe's poorest regions [Music] transnistria which has only 500,000 inhabitants is not recognized by any state in the world it remains a Russian outpost and it still has its statue of Lenin [Music] my name is Tatiana Yaskawa I'm 26 years old at this time chairwoman of the NGO agency for regional development of Transnistria like for me I have no idea now with all of this process which is going around Transnistria now what will be our future but I hope it will be better that it is now like because I'm very good like I'm very optimist she sees herself as a sort of ambassador for Russia the whole of Transnistria looks like a small Soviet republic [Music] our people really love Russia and there is almost no like negative approach and negative sinks of feelings to their tutor the Russia Russian Federation in fact there is one culture there is one language the Russian one there is one like almost one history and Russia provide for this time a lot of a lot of assistance the existence of Transnistria is based on the old pillars of the Soviet Union the army a common language and a policy of dependency Moscow pays for part of the pensions of Transnistria and retirees which certainly doesn't harm their love for Russia many of them long for the good old days that Yanis grandmother is a typical example [Music] when you look at a hand for example you have five fingers with five fingers it's easier to take or carry something try doing the same with one finger the Soviet Union was like a single powerful hand but today it's different all that is gone everyone pulls in his own direction everyone has his own household I don't like this many people of her generation see only disadvantages in the way things are now and advantages in the way things were the Soviet system of values is still hanging on in our village we not only have Russians and Moldovans but also Bulgarians and Belarussians all kinds of nationalities fate brought us together we live together in friendship in the collective where we worked today it's different you're Russian you're Ukrainian you're Belarusian you're this or that the new republics were also struggling with the delayed consequences of socialist planning each had always been dependent on the others and none of them could exist alone Moldova for example was the vineyard of the Soviet Union Moldovan wines were exported all over the USSR from Moscow to Minsk from Leningrad to Kiev but once motiva distanced itself from Moscow business slumped and not entirely coincidentally it is written as it was difficult to sell our products we no longer had the option to export we used to export to Russia Ukraine and Belarus now this was no longer possible the old planned economy the economic foundation of the Soviet Union crumbled and has hindered the development of free markets to this day many of the new states trying to implement a free market economy but they had no experience of anything like it at the beginning of the 90s everything ground to a halt even in Russia [Music] notable absolute nah extra denominator that yeah it was an incredibly difficult task we wanted to move step by step from a systematically organized system to a market economy and the whole thing was supposed to happen in keeping with people's lives liudmila stims to luge's ruled the method of privatization russia chose looked like Lenin's last bright idea each citizen received a share of the common property the factories and collective farms created during the Soviet era vouchers and stock certificates were distributed [Music] but the idea was doomed to failure therefore boosted pewter ho - scoffs cool a quick transition to fairytales happens only in fairy tales in reality it doesn't work the individual elements of the market were shocking for people who grew up in a socialist system nor is our solution the former Soviet citizens couldn't do anything with the vouchers because their value meant nothing to them so they gave them away or exchanged them often in return for daily necessities or they invested in stocks without knowing what was behind them in the Soviet Union people really didn't understand why they had to make money no matter how much money they had they still couldn't buy an apartment anyway the apartments were allocated by the state no matter how much money you had you couldn't buy property or an apartment for your daughter not even a car now you could if you knew how but most Russians didn't know but if you were clever you could amass a fortune by buying up individually worthless vouchers so-called businessmen often from the old nomenclature ax had a field day in the gray area between shrewdness and criminality they laid the foundations for incredible wealth and social influence the oligarchs appeared what was supposed to be a classless society was becoming the very opposite Eusebius torture just on the premier elements enira me it was no secret that the largest shareholders in a company were often their former managers we call them red directors anyone who managed a large industrial enterprise in the Soviet Union as a rule became its owner during privatisation this person would be well-acquainted with the company and could take it over with little effort Zara she suddenly saw sinking post-soviet society was tilting out of balance the old communists wanted to stop the privatization and rebelled against Boris Yeltsin [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] nationalists and populist Slyke Vladimir Zhirinovsky who wanted to resurrect the old Russia attracted more and more followers the Russian parliament sometimes started to resemble a carnival boxing match [Music] Vladimir Zhirinovsky ran for president in 1993 and almost seemed to have a chance of winning Democrat democracy was alive the elections were fake his privatization was robbery crime had spiraled it was sheer banditry all the bad things in the world were thrown into our country that's why the population today it's the Democrats so much in 1993 the reformists who had been elected to Parliament before the disintegration of the Soviet Union tried to launch a coup against Boris Yeltsin jetson responded by bombing the Parliament building this unprecedented move kept him in power [Music] but the next elections were approaching and Yeltsin had few successes to show it was a real threat that the Communists would return to power and there was then tomorrow how to avoid it and yet in Yeltsin hers and his entourage had decided to seek the support of saket oligarchs who offered money for the support for the campaign in exchange they give loans to yeltsin group in exchange for shares in still state-owned enterprises this was when the oligarchs took over the real power in the Kremlin these rich men paid for Yeltsin's election campaign and after he won they got their rewards high office in the government and especially great influence on Yeltsin his power waned and he became a little more than a puppet he only listened to those who constantly told him what a genius he was that he was on the same level as Clinton and Thatcher or that he would be admitted to the g7 or g8 that's why he conducted that orchestra in Germany when he was drunk and after he'd been to America for the first time he said on TV I flew around the Statue of Liberty twice so I'm twice as free during his second term in office Yeltsin was increasingly ridiculed as some sort of clumsy dancing bear [Music] he had become politically irrelevant [Music] the stupid novel espadrille is slowly it became like it was in the Byzantine Empire with intrigues and nepotism and strange arrangements and crooked deals which had nothing to do with the people nor with the government somehow comical characters suddenly started making the important decisions Belarus was one of the most important Soviet republics one of the four founding republics of the USSR and one of the three were nuclear weapons were stationed today Minsk is the capital of the Republic of Belarus it's a city full of red flags and it looks as if the Soviet Union had never been away [Music] sunny sviazhsky [ __ ] is now a pensioner in Minsk his fate is a metaphor for the way the states of the former Soviet Union have changed [Music] yes once he acted on the world stage he talked to Bill Clinton and negotiated with the powerful today he doesn't even get enough to live on as to when the poacher pins mr. ransom today I received a pension of 30 euro cents it was supposed to amount to 75 percent of the salary of the president of Parliament the Supreme Soviet our Parliament changed its name there is no Supreme Soviet anymore who knows I've eaten yet when he became the first head of state in Belarus in 1991 shoosh gavage wanted to orient his country westwards and move it from a planned to a free market economy as quickly as possible as he had learned from the Chernobyl disaster lies and illusions do nothing for a country's fortunes [Music] we brush Lipa we needed a new beginning and took the correct a logical route that Poland also took we wanted to privatize our economy everything had belonged to the state and we wanted our citizens to be part of it because they had nothing back then but it's a very difficult process that can never be completely fair he quickly found out how difficult it was to broker reform two people who mourned the Soviet Union and glorified its memory the Communists in his government blocked his reforms [Music] in 1993 they succeeded in removing him from office through accusations of corruption that later turned out to be false the man behind the allegations was Alexander Lukashenko [Music] Lu's Nabila they had to discredit me that's why all of our propagandists have portrayed me as a corrupt man who didn't actually do anything apart from steel in 1994 Alexander Lukashenko was elected president and has been in power ever since he pushed through constitutional changes to allow himself more than two terms in office new tkachenko is Moscow's closest ally Jiri nationalized many private companies and in the mid-1990s looked as if he would resurrect the old-style Soviet Union including its official language his Belarusian is worse than his Russians so he needs two official languages he's a coarse badly educated dictator at the group Amala Brazil an educated opposition is largely forbidden in Belarus in the 1990s shushkevich stood as a candidate for a new party but he didn't stand a chance at that time he still hoped to supplant the old values with new ones it was a vain hope the overwhelming majority of people in Belarus support democratic principles our leadership only came to power with Russia's help that's what he wants and everyone else shuts up and accept it if they object he removes them from the fee trough and a fast bucks but the West doesn't understand that we're not a state based on law and order and that the way to becoming one has been blocked we're not a country where the government is democratically elected we were moving towards it but then we were stopped - Yolanda lacunae bottomless Lula Bradley so at least Russia got one Ally back but in the mid-90s it was still mired in crisis Baris Elson had become the antithesis of a strong man and was spending more time in hospital than in the Kremlin ordinary Russians were worse off than ever after the great ruble crisis in 1998 and 99 yet Tsin stepped down in the middle of his second term of office from a precision Tracy here producing yeah Oh casual but stuff the new top dog in the Kremlin was to be Yeltsin's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin Putin quickly adopted the image of a fearless fighter and enjoys appearing in public in front of military symbols I have the impression that president Putin's personality is a combination of Peter the Great and Stalin he wants to Train Russia which could actually be a free democratic and prosperous Republic into an empire again as it was in the days of the Tsar's and the Soviet Union the longer the West puts up with his arts the bloodier the end will be and the bloodier any attempt to stop him good customer Tan has said a thousand times that we do not want to attack or threaten anyone and as I've already said Europe has been attacking us for a thousand years but we have never attacked anyone putain certainly acts like a man who is capable of attack he gets his nickname Nimitz the German from his ears as a Secret Service operative in East Germany he knows the mechanisms of power and believes that the pillars on which the Soviet Union rested haven't been lost forever reassured and anxious at the same time all eyes are turned to Moscow where the lights are back on in the Kremlin [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: DW Documentary

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Rating: 4.708385 out of 5

Keywords: Documentary, Russia, Vladimir Putin, Soviet Union, Cold War, Ukraine, Ukraine conflict, DW, dw documentary, documentary, deutsche welle documentary

Id: fSqMpZ5qhz0

Length: 42min 26sec (2546 seconds)

Published: Sat Nov 04 2017