ABSTRACT
Mikhail Gorbachev’s accession to power in March of 1985 was the same as that of his predecessors, Brezhnev and Andropov. Gorbachev used the support of certain political Party elite members and KGB leadership to take control of the oce of General Secretary (Knight, 1988). Also, similar to Andropov, during his rst year as a general secretary, Gorbachev launched an anticorruption campaign that was oen used against his political opponents within the party and the MVD (Ministry of Internal Aairs).
