Originally posted by Hardu
The Soviet Union collapsed because Gorbachev recognized that the Stalinist economic system was incapable of competing with the US in an arms race. By 1980 the SU was devoting 30-50 pct of GNP and all its advanced industries to defence.
This gave them a huge army based on 1960s technology and a minimal strategic partity with the US within the framework of the early 70s arms control treaties.
When the US got fed up with Soviet behaviour in 1979 (invasion of Afghanistan, moblization for the invasion of Poland, deployment of second generation intermediate nuclera forces) and started rearming for the first time since 1939 (in terms of force structure, training and doctrine) the Soviet leadership realized that it could not compete. When they failed to mobilize enough opposition to the NATO deployment of intermediate range missiles in 1982/83 (the "peace offensive" backfired completely; it entrenched Thatcher and brought the right to power in several key Nato countries instead) they had absolutely no policy options open except war - which the ailing Soviet leadership undre Brezhnev did not want. They were not suicidal.
In fact the invasion of Afghanistan and the moblization against Poland in 1979 totally disrupted the Soviet economy and showed that the conventional opition for war was just as destructive to the Soviet system as a nuclear war. At the same time the US Army emerged from under the shadow of the Air Force's nuclear cowboys and was allowed to plan and prepare for a real war on the ground. By 1985 NATO conventional readiness on the Central Front foreclosed on a Soviet "come as you are war". As war launched without mobilization would not be a success and the SU did not stand a change in a protractecd conventional war in any case, the 200+ divisions of the Soviet Army were only an encumbrance on the economy.
When Gorbached introduced glasnost and perestroika in an attempt to modernise the Soviet system to make it competitive with the West he opened the floodgates for criticism of and opposition to the Soviet system.
The early 80s was in a very real sense WWI on the Western Front minus the shooting. NATO attrited the Soviet Union to defeat because it could potentially deploy far more resources. And did actually deploy a far greater number of troops than is generally recognized. (To put it that way, the Bundeswehr was the amry von Seeckt dreamed of. But the Germans also provide a million and a half troops for logistics and security leaving the US free to concentrate on deploying combat troops to Germany. THe USAEUR comprised 10 divisional equivalents, even if only 4 and 2/3 were actually permanently deployed to Europe).
The Soviet Union in the real sene collpased because it lost WWIII.
And iI doff my hat both to Reagan for starting it and to Gorbachev for accepting inevitable defeat. Both are truly great men.
