ABSTRACT
In an attempt to significantly politicize the Warsaw Pact, Gorbachev resorted to weakening the military and security agenda, replacing it with issues he considered important. The future form of state socialism belonged among them. However, after 1987, intensifying the efforts by Gorbachev and his aides triggered major division among the member states, paralyzing the organization to a large extent. This happened despite the alliance had the most sophisticated structure in its entire existence from an institutional point of view. Furthermore, both reformists and dogmatists initially perceived the Warsaw Pact as an instrument which might help promote their perspective on the future form of the socio-political order of Eastern Bloc countries. These ambitions did not materialize in the end as no effective fractions were established within the alliance. In the second half of 1989, the Warsaw Pact became so fragmented that any military action by the organization – particularly to preserve the monopoly of communist power in the member states – was hard to imagine.
