The death of Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), aroused marked tributes on Wednesday in Western countries, but more measured in Russia, where many accuse him of having provoked, in spite of himself, the collapse of Soviet power.
He died Tuesday evening at the age of 91 following a “long and serious illness”, announced the Central Clinical Hospital in Moscow, where he was being treated.
Mikhail Gorbachev, one of the main political figures of the XXe century, marked history by precipitating the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, when he tried to save it through democratic and economic reforms.
A geopolitical earthquake, the dislocation of the USSR marked the end of the Cold War, the echoes of which have however resonated again since the offensive launched in Ukraine by the current Russian President, Vladimir Putin.
Before his death, Mikhail Gorbachev had not spoken publicly about this conflict of unprecedented violence in Europe since the Second World War, in which Westerners see a resurgence of Russian imperialism.
For the last 20 years of his life, he had regularly worried about growing tensions with Washington, calling for a reduction in nuclear arsenals, as he had done in the 1980s.
In a very measured message of condolence, Vladimir Putin evoked the memory of a man who had “a great influence on the history of the world” and who “guided our country through a period of complex and dramatic changes and great challenges”.
Funeral of unknown magnitude
By contrast, Western officials have paid heavy tribute to the 1990 Nobel Peace Prize-winner for his drastic defusing of East-West confrontation.
US President Joe Biden hailed a “rare leader” who left “a safer world”.
Mikhail Gorbachev, who brought about the fall of the Berlin Wall and then German reunification, “changed my life in fundamental ways”, said ex-Chancellor Angela Merkel, who grew up in the former East Germany.
Pope Francis for his part underlined “his far-sighted commitment to understanding and fraternity among peoples as well as to the progress of his own country at a time marked by important changes”.
Gorbachev’s funeral will be held in Moscow on Saturday, Russian news agencies reported, but few details are known at this time. According to the TASS agency, he is planned to be buried next to his wife, Raisa Gorbacheva, who died in 1999.
The size of the funeral, private or state, with or without Vladimir Putin, will give an idea of the place that the current Russian authorities want to give to the last Soviet leader in their history books.
In fact, the legacy of Mikhail Gorbachev is controversial in Russia: if he is the one through whom freedom of expression could emerge, he was responsible for much of the break-up of a superpower and the terrible years of crisis that followed.
Ambivalent legacy
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday that he had a “romantic” view of relations between Russia and Western countries.
Imprisoned Russian opponent Alexei Navalny stressed that Gorbachev had known how to leave power “peacefully […]a great feat by the standards of the former USSR”.
Russian journalist Dmitry Muratov, co-winner of the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize and editor of the independent newspaper Novaya Gazetasupported from its creation by Mikhail Gorbachev, spoke of a leader who “despised war”.
Born in 1931 into a modest family in southwestern Russia, the former leader came to the top of power in 1985, after rapidly climbing the ranks within the Communist Party.
Until his resignation in 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev pushed through major democratic reforms known as perestroika (“restructuring”) and glasnost (“transparency”). He is also the one who ordered the end of the disastrous Soviet military campaign in Afghanistan.
However, the years that followed the dissolution of the USSR remain a trauma for many Russians, who were then plunged into searing poverty, political chaos and a bloody war in Chechnya.
With the arrival at the head of Russia in 2000 of Vladimir Putin, who said he considered the disappearance of the Soviet Union as “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe” of the 20e century, the state brought society into line while exalting Russian power.
Mikhail Gorbachev had a complex relationship with Mr. Putin, whom he criticized while seeing in him a chance for the stable development of Russia.
In particular, he was in favor of Moscow’s annexation of the Ukrainian Crimean peninsula in 2014, which in 2016 earned him a ban on entering Ukraine.