ABSTRACT
The impact of the multinational character of the Soviet state on United States (US) foreign policy, the truth is that at no time in the US relationship with Soviet Russia has the imperial character of the Soviet state had a significant effect on US policy toward the Soviet Union. The rhetoric of "rollback," and the policies of "bridge building," and "differentiation," were aimed at Eastern Europe insofar as change within that region might affect the problem of Soviet power in Europe, which was expressed largely through the hegemonic Soviet power position in the region. "Indeed, what is striking about the Mikhail Gorbachev period is the absence of mass, politically directed violence of the kind ordinarily associated with the transformations under way in the Soviet Union. The US government made explicit its support for Gorbachev, and thus of his concept of the union, as the basis of policy toward the Soviet Union.
