Circle of Willis
Well-known member
In August of 1991, eight hard-liner opponents of Mikhail Gorbachev's reforms attempted a coup d'etat with the support of the KGB and elements of the military in a bid to 'save' the USSR. They briefly took down communications, claimed to depose Gorbachev in favor of his vice-president Gennady Yanayev, and proclaimed themselves the 'State Committee on the State of Emergency'. However, due to a combination of failing to arrest Boris Yeltsin, some of their troops apparently getting cold feet and refusing to massacre civilians who had gathered to oppose the coup, and the conspirators consequently losing their nerve while Gorbachev and Yeltsin remained standing, the conspiracy failed and some of the plotters killed themselves. All the hard-liners managed to do was, ironically, accelerate the Soviet Union's collapse.
Now, what if the coup had succeeded, at least in Moscow? Suppose in this timeline the plotters manage to arrest Yeltsin, or even if they don't, that their troops have no compunctions about storming the Russian White House when commanded to do so regardless of the losses they'll inevitably inflict on the oppositionist civilians who have gathered to protect it. Would the State Emergency Committee be able to purge their opponents and keep the Soviet Union going (even just limping) into at least the early 21st century? Or would their actions just touch off a more rapid set of secessions among the peripheral SSRs and/or a civil war in Russia itself?
Now, what if the coup had succeeded, at least in Moscow? Suppose in this timeline the plotters manage to arrest Yeltsin, or even if they don't, that their troops have no compunctions about storming the Russian White House when commanded to do so regardless of the losses they'll inevitably inflict on the oppositionist civilians who have gathered to protect it. Would the State Emergency Committee be able to purge their opponents and keep the Soviet Union going (even just limping) into at least the early 21st century? Or would their actions just touch off a more rapid set of secessions among the peripheral SSRs and/or a civil war in Russia itself?