The Last Empire: The Final Days of the Soviet Union - Softcover

Plokhy, Serhii

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0465046711 ISBN 13: 9780465046713

Publisher: Basic Books, 2015

Synopsis

"A stirring account of an extraordinary moment." --Wall Street Journal
On Christmas Day, 1991, President George H. W. Bush addressed the nation to celebrate what he described as a historic American victory: Mikhail Gorbachev's resignation as Soviet prime minister and the subsequent fall of the Soviet Union. The enshrining of that narrative, one in which the end of the Cold War was linked to the triumph of democratic values over communism, took center stage in American public discourse and has persisted for decades--with disastrous consequences for American standing in the world. As prize-winning historian Serhii Plokhy reveals in The Last Empire, the collapse of the Soviet Union was anything but the handiwork of the United States. Bush, in fact, was firmly committed to supporting Gorbachev as he attempted to hold together the USSR in the face of growing independence movements in its republics. Drawing on recently declassified documents and original interviews with key participants, Plokhy presents a bold new interpretation of the Soviet Union's final months, providing invaluable insight into the origins of the current Russian-Ukrainian conflict and the outset of the most dangerous crisis in East-West relations since the end of the Cold War.

About this title

About the Author

Serhii Plokhy is Mykhailo Hrushevsky Professor of Ukrainian History at Harvard University. A recipient of Harvard University's Walter Channing Cabot award and author of Yalta: The Price of Peace, Plokhy lives in Arlington, Massachusetts.

Review

"A superb read: a deeply researched, indispensable reappraisal of the fall of the USSR that has the nail-biting drama of a movie, the gripping narrative and colorful personalities of a novel, and the analysis and original sources of a work of scholarship."―Simon Sebag Montefiore, BBC History Magazine (Best History Books of the Year)

"Using recently released documents, Plokhy traces in fascinating detail the complex events that led to the Soviet Union's implosion."―Foreign Affairs

"A fine-grained, closely reported, highly readable account of the upheavals of 1991."―Financial Times

"Plokhy makes a convincing case that the misplaced triumphalism of the senior Bush's administration led to the disastrous hubris of his son's."―Slate

"A fascinating and readable deep dive into the final half-year of the Soviet Union."―Sunday Telegraph (UK)

"A superb work of scholarship, vividly written, that challenges tired old assumptions with fresh material from East and West, as well as revealing interviews with many major players."―Spectator (UK)

"An incisive account of the five months leading up to the Union's dissolution.... His vibrant, fast-paced narrative style captures the story superbly."―Sunday Times (UK)

"Almost a day-by-day, blow-by-blow account of the actions and reactions of the main figures.... Very relevant to today's Ukrainian crisis...very well recounted."
―Literary Review (UK)

"Serhii Plokhy's great achievement in this wonderfully well-written account is to show that much of the triumphalist transatlantic view of the Soviet collapse is historiographical manure."―Times of London (UK)


"Plokhy does a good job of debunking much of the conventional wisdom, especially prevalent in the United States, about the American role in the break-up of the Soviet Union.... His setting the record straight is also of more than historiographical significance." ―Times Literary Supplement

About this edition

• Publisher: Basic Books
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 0465046711
• ISBN 13: 9780465046713
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 544