Soviet Civil War in 90s?

Just a thought which I am sure has been explored before but what if the Fall of the Soviet Union had been much worse? If the coup against Gorbachev had been much closer and had led to the Soviet Union sliding into Civil War?
 

Yun-shuno

Banned
Lots of ethnic unrest, Caucasus would be literally Hell on Earth, foreign support of various factions, oh my I don't even want to think about the nukes, various secession attempts and all other kinds of crazy.

It was possible certainly-it would have made the 90s probably a bloodier and more crazy decade than the 40s.

It certainly wouldn't have been a good thing.
 
If the coup had succeeded and the hardliners tried to violently suppress the independence movements it would have been a bloodbath in the Caucusus not to mention Ukraine, the Baltics and Central Asia.
 
It wouldn't be an ideological civil war but one based on separatism and the future of Russia. Within Russia there could be a Communist faction that wants to turn back to the glory days of the USSR, however that is unlikely to happen due to multiple independence movements and Gorbachev's reformers.
 
Like others said if the 1991 coup hardliners were willing to use force and there was enough support in the military, there would be a real possibility. Fighting with all former republics trying to prevent them from leaving.
 

RousseauX

Donor
If the coup had succeeded and the hardliners tried to violently suppress the independence movements it would have been a bloodbath in the Caucusus not to mention Ukraine, the Baltics and Central Asia.
Central Asia was actually the part of the union which didn't want to leave
 
Most republics wanted to stay in the union, especially the asian ones. as they benefited from being part of the larger collective. it was Russia itself that clicked the delete button on its empire.

now if they tried to keep the Baltics by force that would be another story.

Even Ukraine, who wanted a lot more self autonomy and control over its own matters ( honestly I am not sure if they would go to war or not, they just might if tanks roll into Kyiv), still was looking to ratify the new union treaty. break ups go bad and the flash point would have been the caucuses and southern Russia.

I don't see the west trying to support anyone but the central government though, too much at stake with nukes and other nasty items laying around for use, it simply would not be in the interest of humanity for things to dissolve into all out multi faction, multi front war. In the end the soviet union was basically confined to the Kremlin.

I think if you want things to go very sour you need to jump back a few years. have the soviets roll the tanks into Poland and eastern Europe to attempt to suppress the independence movements.
this in turn turns bloody, those states inside the soviet union that wanted out rebel as well as they see the central government has replaced Gorbachev and scrapped the liberal policies, also rise up and fight against a crumbling Moscow positon.
 
Just a thought which I am sure has been explored before but what if the Fall of the Soviet Union had been much worse? If the coup against Gorbachev had been much closer and had led to the Soviet Union sliding into Civil War?

The Azeri-Armenia conflict was already going on and the Georgia-Abkhazia war.
 
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