Russia. A History

Twentieth Party Congress (Khrushchev’s ‘secret speech’ denouncing Stalin); CC resolution ‘On Overcoming the Cult of the Individual and Its Consequences’ (30 June); Hungarian insurrection (November)

1957

Decentralization proposal (sovnarkhozy) adopted in May; anti-party group defeated (June); demotion of Marshal Zhukov (October); ‘Sputnik’ launched (October)

1958

Boris Pasternak awarded Nobel Prize for Doctor Zhivago; new penal code, eliminating category of ‘enemies of the people’ (December)

1959

Sino-Soviet split becomes public; Twenty-First Party Congress; Khrushchev launches maize campaign 1960 American reconnaissance plane, U-2, shot down inside Russia

1961

Capital punishment extended to economic crimes (May); Twenty-Second Party Congress (October); Stalin’s body removed from Kremlin (31 October); first manned space flight

1962

Publication of A. Solzhenitsyn’s One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich; Novocherkassk disorders (June); Cuban missile crisis (October)

1963

Exceptionally poor harvest

1964

Removal of N. S. Khrushchev (14 October)

1965

CC approves plan for economic reform (September); publication of A. Nekrich’s 22 June 1941

1966

Trial of dissident writers Iu. Daniel and Andrei Siniavskii (February); Twenty-Third Party Congress (March) 1968 Demonstration by Crimean Tatars (April); invasion of Czechoslovakia (August); first issue of Chronicle of Current Events

1970

Establishment of Human Rights Committee (November)

1971

Jewish demonstration in Moscow, beginning of large-scale Jewish emigration

1972

SALT-I (arms limitations); Shevardnadze becomes party boss in Georgia

1974

Deportation of Solzhenitsyn from USSR

1975

Helsinki agreement on European Security and Co-operation; Sakharov awarded Nobel Prize for peace

1976

Twenty-fifth Party Congress

1977

New Soviet constitution; Brezhnev becomes President of the USSR

1978

Trial of Anatolii Shcharanskii

1979

SALT-II (arms limitation agreement); Soviet intervention in Afghanistan

1980

Exile of Sakharov to Gorky (January)

1981

Twenty-Sixth Party Congress

1982

Death of L. I. Brezhnev (10 November), replaced by Andropov

1984

Andropov dies, replaced by Chernenko (February)

1985

Chernenko’s death, replacement by Mikhail Gorbachev (11 March)

1985–1995

From Perestroika to Dissolution of the USSR

1985

Mikhail Gorbachev elected General Secretary (11 March); Eduard Shevardnadze appointed Foreign Minister (2 July); first superpower summit between Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan in Geneva (November)

1986

Tbilisi disorders, with twenty demonstrators slain by Soviet troops (9 April); Chernobyl disaster (26 April); riots in Alma-Ata (December)

1987

Twenty-seventh Party Congress (February-March); new law on ‘socialist enterprise’; Yeltsin dismissed as Moscow party chief (November)

1988

Nineteenth Party Conference transforms role of Communist Party (June)

1989

Ethnic conflict erupts in Nagorno-Karabakh (February); USSR Congress of People’s Deputies elected in partly democratic elections (March); anti-perestroika letter by Nina Andreeva; Gorbachev announces plan to withdraw from Afghanistan (April); miners’ strike (July 1989); first national movement, Sajudis, forms in Lithuania (November)

1990

Election of People’s Deputies of Russian Federation (March); formation of Communist Party of the Russian Federation, with Ivan Polozkov as leader (June); Twenty-eighth Party Congress, with defection of Boris Yeltsin and leaders of Democratic Platform to establish their own party; Gorbachev elected President of the USSR (September)

1991

Soviet troops attack TV centre in Vilnius, killing 14 (January); Boris Yeltsin elected President of the Russian Federation (June); ultimatum to Gorbachev to resign in favour of Gennadii Ianaev signals beginning of attempted coup (18 August); Yeltsin makes his way to White House to lead opposition to putsch (19 August); attempted coup collapses (21 August); Yeltsin announces plans for economic reform (October); Estonia, Latvia, Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, and Azerbaijan declare independence (August-September); Chechnya declares independence (November); Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus agree on formation of Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) (8 December); CIS formally constituted in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan (21 December); resignation of Gorbachev (25 December); formal dissolution of the USSR (31 December)

1992

Gaidar introduces radical ‘shock therapy’ economic reforms (January); constitutional referendum (April); Tashkent summit (March); Black Sea accord between Ukraine and Russia (August); privatization vouchers issued (1 October); Yeltsin appoints V. Chernomyrdin as Prime Minister (14 December)

1993