ABSTRACT
From the perspective of Americans, Europeans, and Russians, the period from 1945 up until the early 1990s saw the world clearly divided into two spheres dominated by the Soviet Union and the United States. But on December 26, 1991, the Soviet Union dissolved, leaving Russia and a group of former Soviet republics as independent entities. The collapse had a number of effects, but the most immediate concern was to prevent the Soviet Union's nuclear weapons from falling into the wrong hands. In return for security assurances from the United States and Great Britain, the newly independent Ukraine, home to Soviet nuclear missiles, surrendered its nuclear capability. The victory, however, left Saddam Hussein in power and had a number of other consequences. Immense riches generated by oil sales did not make their way to much of the population, and most nations in the Middle East remained mired in poverty.
