No reforms: how long does the USSR last after 1985?

No reforms: how long does the USSR last after 1985?

  • 1991

    Votes: 11 15.7%
  • 1996

    Votes: 24 34.3%
  • 2000

    Votes: 8 11.4%
  • 2004

    Votes: 2 2.9%
  • Today

    Votes: 25 35.7%

  • Total voters
    70

RousseauX

Donor
Authoritarian regimes are the most in danger when they attempt reforms instead of just carrying out the status quo, sure the people are mad about the economy or repression but regimes usually have tools to make sure they don't become too upset. Or at very least that they are too scared of having them and their family shot to voice their discontent too openly.

OTL Gorbachev destroyed the foundations holding the USSR together, inadvertently I might add, through his reforms. What if we had a series of conservative (Gishin, Grigory Romanov?) general secretaries who tries to keep up the status quo for as long as possible. How long does the USSR last?
 
Maybe early in the turn of the century, at most. The USSR was already rotting at the core when Gorbachev was picked, it was one of the reasons he was picked. A big reason why times of reform are dangerous to regimes is that they tend to happen when their is no other real choice . Regimes don't change on a whim.
 
1996.
And here's why.
With Solidarity in Poland, the precedent for resistance against Russian domination had been set. The satellites were going to go for political reasons no matter what. That alone would utterly cripple the already rotten Soviet economy - but let's say the USSR proper still survives this shock somehow.
The effectiveness of the security forces holding everything together was still not only disintegrating in the late 80s, but more importantly was falling to ethno-nationalism - There's a reason why Yeltsin effectively stole the Russian part of the USSR away from the Supreme Soviet.
No amount of hardliners of the Soviet ilk would be able to stop that from happening, without also kissing the other SSRs goodbye.
 

RousseauX

Donor
1996.
And here's why.
With Solidarity in Poland, the precedent for resistance against Russian domination had been set. The satellites were going to go for political reasons no matter what. That alone would utterly cripple the already rotten Soviet economy - but let's say the USSR proper still survives this shock somehow.
The effectiveness of the security forces holding everything together was still not only disintegrating in the late 80s, but more importantly was falling to ethno-nationalism - There's a reason why Yeltsin effectively stole the Russian part of the USSR away from the Supreme Soviet.
No amount of hardliners of the Soviet ilk would be able to stop that from happening, without also kissing the other SSRs goodbye.
But the reason why ethno-nationalism suddenly rose in the 1980s had to do with loosening of state control over intellectuals and the media in the first place. No reforms means there's no open elections in which Yeltsin gets elected RSFSR president for instance.

The USSR kept the lid on nationalism since the 1920s, the lid stays on w/o reforms
 
But the reason why ethno-nationalism suddenly rose in the 1980s had to do with loosening of state control over intellectuals and the media in the first place. No reforms means there's no open elections in which Yeltsin gets elected RSFSR president for instance.

The USSR kept the lid on nationalism since the 1920s, the lid stays on w/o reforms

The methods through which ethno-nationlism can become imbued within the bureaucracy may not exist without perestroika but there's a reason why it rose to prominence in the first place - first and foremost the satellites' political nationalism (as a tool of resistance) was already a widespread thing by Gorbachev. They were going to leave and in the short term.

And while the SSRs of the USSR experienced this to a lessor extent - it was instead the Russian SFSR that experienced a reverse nationalist surge - against what was perceived as the backward, free-loader republics of the USSR.

Ethno-nationalism was on the rise - regardless of how open the society was about discussing it
 
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The USSR could have existed as long as it's leaders were willing to use violence and the army was willing to back them. Overtime they would have to increasingly pay off the army's leaders but they could have maintained the structure. If they computerized their bureaucracy they may have even seen some economic growth.
 
1996.
And here's why.
With Solidarity in Poland, the precedent for resistance against Russian domination had been set. The satellites were going to go for political reasons no matter what. That alone would utterly cripple the already rotten Soviet economy - but let's say the USSR proper still survives this shock somehow.
The effectiveness of the security forces holding everything together was still not only disintegrating in the late 80s, but more importantly was falling to ethno-nationalism - There's a reason why Yeltsin effectively stole the Russian part of the USSR away from the Supreme Soviet.
No amount of hardliners of the Soviet ilk would be able to stop that from happening, without also kissing the other SSRs goodbye.

Not at all, the satellites could have been maintained by using pure military force. Ethno-nationalism was primarily enabled by perestroika and glasnost. Yeltsin would have become a persona non grata if the USSR had maintained Brezhnev style rule. Don't forget that in 1990 nearly all the SSR's voted to stay in the Soviet Union.
 
Not at all, the satellites could have been maintained by using pure military force. Ethno-nationalism was primarily enabled by perestroika and glasnost. Yeltsin would have become a persona non grata if the USSR had maintained Brezhnev style rule. Don't forget that in 1990 nearly all the SSR's voted to stay in the Soviet Union.

And it makes sense that they did - they feasted off the backs of the far more robust Russian portion of the Soviet Economy.
But this was by design, as the outer republics were completely dependent on the Moscow - thus why they perfered status quo.

Remember, it was the Russian people who wanted to leave the Soviet Union once everything started breaking apart and much of it was due to rising nationalism and a promise of "Russia, for the Russians" by Yeltsin and his kind.
 
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And it makes sense that they did - they feasted off the backs of the far more robust Russian portion of the Soviet Economy.
By design, the outer republics were completely dependent on the Moscow - thus why they perfered status quo.

Remember, it was the Russian people who wanted to leave the Soviet Union, once everything started breaking apart and much of it was due to rising nationalism and a promise of "Russia, for the Russians" by Yeltsin

There was a core component of Russian people who wanted to leave the USSR, but obviously a lot of that was rabble rousing by Yeltsin and Liberal political views spreading enabled by glasnost, I mean the Communists almost won the election until Yeltsin forged it and shelled the soviet in the 1990's. It's hard to see how nationalist like Yeltsin would get anywhere in a non reformist USSR, he would have been expelled from the party and sent to Siberia in the Brezhnev years.
 

RousseauX

Donor
And it makes sense that they did - they feasted off the backs of the far more robust Russian portion of the Soviet Economy.
But this was by design, as the outer republics were completely dependent on the Moscow - thus why they perfered status quo.

Remember, it was the Russian people who wanted to leave the Soviet Union once everything started breaking apart and much of it was due to rising nationalism and a promise of "Russia, for the Russians" by Yeltsin and his kind.
They did so only after the August Coup in 1991 which destroyed trust in the Soviet government and because Yeltsin was an alternative.

Without the reforms there wouldn't have being need for a hardliner coup, nor would Yeltsin (or an equivalent) have gained the legitimacy (he was elected) nor the power (the CPUSSR's control over Republican leaders would have being maintained) to dissolve the Soviet Union.
 
I think the USSR could last indefinitely, provided it takes a page from OTL North Korea and allows some market incentives for its citizens on the side while having the state-controlled sector of the economy keep chugging along in all its inefficiency. As OTL Russia shows, a lot of people who lived in the former Soviet Union really valued stability over all else and would have preferred a bland but predictable (and therefore safe) system that they and their parents had known all their lives. There'd be underground dissenters and they'd have a gradual effect on the country and its culture, but only in the same way that dissent exists in Putin's authoritarianism: it exists but its influence is marginal.

The biggest hurdles are in the Caucasus and Baltic states, which may try to break off a la Eastern Europe. An unreformed USSR won't allow this. They will become a lesson in blood, much like Tiananmen. Given the choice of being bombed back to 1945, or leading the same old life under the Soviets, most would go with the latter.

EDIT: Sorry, I failed to take into account that the PoD is 1985, not 1989 as I erroneously thought. In that case, the USSR might still be forced to let go of the Pact states, but perhaps not in the spectacular manner of OTL. They might be afforded some more trading rights with the West over time, or their people would be given a little more autonomy, as the gradual development of Solidarity in Poland suggests. It would depend on the regime in question. In some place like Romania it may well be civil war in the mid '90s, whereas Poland and CSSR might be something like "the Soviets pretend to dominate us and we pretend to serve them."
 

Deleted member 97083

What was different between Gorbachev's liberalization programs and Deng Xiaoping's liberalization programs?
 
What was different between Gorbachev's liberalization programs and Deng Xiaoping's liberalization programs?
My detailed understanding of the people and organizations involved in the Soviet reforms is lacking but the main difference is that Deng didn't allow significant political relaxations or allow free media, while the Soviet policy of glasnost permitted direct and very heavy criticism of the Party and government. By the time Zhao Ziyang became CCP General Secretary in 1987 and began proposing his abortive political reforms, China had already been experimenting with economic reform for a few years. I think in the USSR Gorbachev tried doing both political and economic change at the same time.
 
Not much longer than OTL.

It wasn't the Glasnost nor Perestroika that killed the Soviet Union, it was the fact that it was a bankrupt, failed state on it's last breaths by the time Gorbachev rose to power. In fact, in many ways Gorbachev's reforms were an attempt to get on the good side of the West just to make sure his country doesn't lose it's source of survival and thus collapse (which it did anyway, although the West tried it's best to prevent it). And no amount of military force will make up for the fact that your army is starving, your people are starving, your country is broke and your economy is absolutely god awful.
 
The USSR could have existed as long as it's leaders were willing to use violence and the army was willing to back them. Overtime they would have to increasingly pay off the army's leaders but they could have maintained the structure. If they computerized their bureaucracy they may have even seen some economic growth.
How is the USSR supposed to pay off the army when the increasing military budget is bankrupting the country?
 

RousseauX

Donor
How is the USSR supposed to pay off the army when the increasing military budget is bankrupting the country?
You can rely on nuclear deterence to ward of NATO

The majority of the army's budget goes into advanced weapons for conventional warfare vs NATO, if you give up conventional militarily parity you can cut the budget. It's not like the US was going to risk nuclear armagaddon by sending troops into the warsaw pact.
 

RousseauX

Donor
Not much longer than OTL.

It wasn't the Glasnost nor Perestroika that killed the Soviet Union, it was the fact that it was a bankrupt, failed state on it's last breaths by the time Gorbachev rose to power. In fact, in many ways Gorbachev's reforms were an attempt to get on the good side of the West just to make sure his country doesn't lose it's source of survival and thus collapse (which it did anyway, although the West tried it's best to prevent it). And no amount of military force will make up for the fact that your army is starving, your people are starving,
the soviet people wasn't starving in 1985-1991 though, there were bread lines but everyone got fed. The starvation happened -after- the soviet collapse
your country is broke and your economy is absolutely god awful.
plenty of dictatorships keeps on going despite having shitty economies a common misconception is that dictatorships collapse when the economy goes badly. In reality dictatorships collapse when the regime tries to liberalize.
 
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