The End of the Cold War, Marking the Collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991
The end of the Cold War was marked by the collapse of the Soviet Union on December 25, 1991.
Previously, the end of the Cold War began to be seen in the 1980s when the United States (US) rivalry with the Soviets subsided,
after Mikhail Gorbachev abolished the dictatorship system and grew democracy.
The end of the Cold War in 1991 was celebrated by the then US president, George Bush, with great joy and claiming victory.
Even so, many opinions say that there were actually no winners in the Cold War, and Gorbachev considered the Cold War to be detrimental to all parties involved.
What was the reason for the end of the Cold War?
How the end of the Cold War will look when US President Richard Nixon begins to adopt and implement a new approach to international relations.
Instead of seeing the world as a hostile place for the bipolar system, he suggested why I shouldn't use diplomacy instead of military action.
To that end, he pushed for the United Nations to recognize China's communist government and after traveling there in 1972, began to establish relations with Beijing.
At the same time, he implemented a policy of Detente or relaxation against the Soviet Union.
Citing History, in 1972 Richard Nixon and Soviet prime minister Leonid Brezhnev signed the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT I),
which banned the manufacture of nuclear missiles by both sides and took steps to reduce the threat of nuclear war that had existed for decades.
Despite Nixon's efforts, the Cold War was heating up again under US president Ronald Reagan.
Like many leaders of his generation, Reagan believed that the ubiquitous spread of communism threatened freedom everywhere.
As a result, it seeks to provide financial and military assistance to anti-communist and rebel governments around the world.
This policy, particularly as implemented in places like Grenada and El Salvador, became known as the Reagan Doctrine.
Even as Reagan fought communism in Central America, the Soviet Union collapsed.
In response to the severe economic problems and growing political turmoil in the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev while taking office in 1985 introduced two policies that redefined Russia's relations with the rest of the world, namely Glasnost (political openness) and Perestroika (economic reforms).
However, Glasnost actually sparked divisions in the Soviet Union, because openness and freedom of information allowed the media to reveal every problem in the Soviet Union that was previously covered up.
As a result, Soviet influence in Eastern Europe diminished. In 1989 every other communist country in the region replaced its government with a non-communist one.
In November 1989 the Berlin Wall – the most visible symbol of the Cold War for decades – was finally demolished.
The fall of the Berlin Wall came about two years after Reagan challenged the Soviet prime minister in a speech at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate: "Mr. Gorbachev, destroy this wall."
In 1991 the Soviet Union disbanded and the Cold War ended.
The end of the Cold War has determined the bipolar system and turned it into a multipolar, so that countries are not just sticking to two camps.