DUSHANBE, August 19, 2016, Asia-Plus — The State Committee on the State of Emergency (GKChP) that was set up 25 years ago was the last shady enterprise of the Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, Ismoil Talbakov, the leader of the Communist Party of Tajikistan (CPT), told
Asia-Plus
in an interview.
According to him, the State Committee on the State of Emergency was set up with good intentions — to protect the constitutional order and prevent the collapse of the Soviet Union, “but it was Gorbachev who impeded its organizers’ decisiveness.”
“It is known today that Gorbachev’s main opponent, Boris Yeltsin, was ready to hide in the U.S. Embassy in Moscow, if the GKChP members had taken any decisive measures,” CPT leader said.
He believes that establishment of the State Committee on the State of Emergency had expedited Gorbachev’s plans on the breakup of the Soviet Union “that could be called the great tragedy of the 20th century.”
“All the troubles that have been taking place within the post-Soviet area until now – civil conflicts, slide in the economy, labor migration, unemployment, surge in crime, appearance of new masters of life – all this is effects of the collapse of the Soviet Union,” Talbakov noted.
He further added that it could not be ruled out that the Soviet Union’s political system needed reforms “but the overwhelming majority of the Kremlin functionaries of that time had thought, first of all, about themselves, forgetting about people who had believed in them.”
