Why do YOU think the Soviet Union fell?

[Raptor Jesus]

My explanations -

Mikhail Gorbachev and his radical, reform policies that enabled a free market environment.
Ronald Reagan and his supporting (Or was it Charlie Wilson?) of Afghanistan and the support of their militia.
Those Hard-Line Communists that attempted to start a coup and retake the government, which was overturned...

And so on.

DISCUSS NAO

[Rodrigo360]

I think it was Charlie Winson

[Rodrigo360]

Wilson*

[Shuckle]

Because they touched themselves at night.

[Raptor Jesus]

Because they touched themselves at night.

Hey man...

[Rodrigo360]

Then someone touched himself at night???

[Max Obstruction]

Stalin. He was a brute who took advantage of the workers.

[Raptor Jesus]

He also found ways to get rid of people in his way of becoming the premier :O

[Max Obstruction]

Exactly. He's the reason communism is frowned upon by the knee-jerk reactionaries known as capitalists.

[patsfan07]

It was a combination of things.

The US Afghan coalition that stopped the USSR invasion of Afghanistan cost the Soviets billions. It also led to a loss of national pride after the event.

Ronald Reagan became an unbeatable stone in the US refusing to let the USSR stand. With intense US pressure coupled with a devalued currency, famine, low national pride, and a weakened government it led to the fall of the USSR.

[Max Obstruction]

It wasn't Ronald Reagan. His "tear down that wall" speech wasn't that great either.
I love the fact Reagan still has a personality cult though.

[patsfan07]

Ronald Reagan did contribute.

He stood up to Soviet Russia.

Have you ever heard his speech announcing Project Star Wars?

Reagan did not flinch against the Soviet Union.

[Max Obstruction]

Okay, so he created military projects increasing the debt. I knew he did that, but so did past presidents.
Congratulations, you bankrupted an enemy, and started to bankrupt us!

[patsfan07]

The real cause of debt is some British economist in the 1920s (I forget his name I will try to find it however) who said that the government can stop all depressions even if it means having an unbalanced budget.

The pattern of debt spending was around long before Reagan.

[Max Obstruction]

And Reagan helped it. He also did a good amount of deregulation, that eventually caused the recession we're in today, along with some really dumb regulation on the side of the Democrats, but I'm not a democrat, so you know.