Delving into Cold War Politics through Gorbachev’s on My Country and the World

Abstract

Between 1985 and 1991, as Soviet President, MikhailGorbachev endeavored to uphold democratic values in
Russia through his policies of glasnost and perestroika. He played a decisive role in originating the course
towards arms control, cessation of hostilities and denuclearization, leading to the termination of the Cold
War.As the leader of the USSR in the late 1980s, Gorbachev is known for improving relations with the Western
world and fostering a more liberal environment that contributed to the downfall of communist governments in
Eastern Europe. He set off a far-reaching deluge that traversed to the collapse of the Berlin Wall (1989).
Gorbachev was a persistent backer of peace and the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1990. In On My
Country and the World, he elaborately discusses the foreign policy initiatives he took to end the cold war and
proposes the tenets to maintain world order and stability, seeking non-violent means for conflict resolution
globally. This paper commemorates Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (1931-2022) as a Great Russian Statesman
and Reformer. It examines his version of the truth to bring out his prominent role in changing the course of
world history by averting major confrontations of ideologies, military encounters and nuclear catastrophe.