ABSTRACT
The collapse of Communist Party rule and of Soviet influence and power beginning in 1989 in Central and Eastern Europe, one of the most profound political upheavals of the late twentieth century, took the West, as well as the people in the region, by surprise. The collapse was sudden, unexpected, and traumatic. Conventional wisdom held that communism, despite its flaws, would give way only if the Kremlin were willing to let that happen. Everybody assumed that the Kremlin was determined that the region remain under communist control indefinitely because of its importance to the Soviet Union’s domestic stability and external security, especially vis-à-vis the West.
