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The White House evaluates Soviet Intelligence Capabilities

In the final months of his presidency, shortly before the official dissolution of the Soviet Union, George H. W. Bush instructed the leaders of the US intelligence community to completely reevaluate their raison d'être.

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The Winter of the Soviet Military

By the end of December 1991, the Soviet Union was administratively dissolved. A few weeks beforehand, the United States' Central Intelligence Agency issued this report, assessing the state of the Soviet Military after its failed coup attempt in August of that year.

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UN Security Council on the Civil War in Yugoslavia

In 1990, the Yugoslav Communist Party divided into several separate parties, one for each of the six Yugoslav Republics. Tensions among the ethnic groups of Yugoslavia, divided among the republics, led to an outbreak of a civil war in 1991.

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United Nation's Evaluation of the Peacekeeping Process in Yugoslavia

In 1990, the Yugoslav Communist Party divided into several separate parties, one for each of the six Yugoslav Republics. Tensions among the ethnic groups of Yugoslavia, divided among the republics, led to an outbreak of a civil war by 1991.

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Announcement of a Protest in Bratislava

In the summer of 1989, Slovak dissidents decided to commemorate the anniversary of the Warsaw Pact invasion by publicly laying flowers at various locations in Slovakia where citizens had been killed in 1968. They announced their plans in a letter to the Slovak government dated August 4, 1989.

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Havel's Independence Day Address, 1990

Every political upheaval is followed by a "morning after." In 1990, the new Czechoslovak President, Vaclav Havel, gave an important speech commemorating the one-year anniversary of the Velvet Revolution (the end of Communism in his country).

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Havel's New Year's Address to the Nation, 1990

The dissident Czech writer Vaclav Havel endured decades of political persecution before being elected Czechoslovakia's (later divided into the Czech Republic and Slovakia) first post-socialist president.

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Europe as a Common Home

After gaining the position of General Secretary of the Communist Party, Mikhail Gorbachev set the Soviet Union on the path of reform with perestroika (restructuring) and glasnost' (openness).

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Report from the Working Conference of Opposition Leaders

This report, from September 1, 1988, details the meeting of a diverse coalition of Polish opposition members, consisting of trade unionists, academics, journalists and representatives of the Solidarity movement.

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A speech by Mr. Józef Czyrek at a founding meeting of the Polish Club of International Relations

On May 11, 1988, Józef Czyrek, a member of the Polish Politburo, inaugurated the Polish Club of International Relations, an organization unprecedented in that it included both members of the government and of opposition organizations.