Mikhail Gorbachev and the collapse of communis.

When Mikhai Gorbachev came to power as a general secretary of the communist party of the soviet union (CPSU) on march 11 1985 drastic reforms were demanded if the faltering USSR was to remain as a superpower still able to compete with its arch-rival, the United States. Enmeshed in Afghanistan, threatened by the `New Cold War', with a hawk Ronald Reagan in the White House, the economy was in free fall and living standards were plummeting. Gorbachev's predecessor, Yuri Andropov, has already concluded that reforms were needed, but he fell fatally ill before he could.