Mikhail Gorbachev and the collaspe communism

When Mikhail sergeyevich Gorbachev came to power as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union CPSU on 11 March 1985 drastic reforms were demanded if the faltering USSR was to remain a superpower still able to compete with its arch-rival, the United States. Enmeshed in Afghanistan, threatened by the New Cold War, with Ronald Regan in the White House, the economy was in free fall and living standards were plummeting.