Jump to content

Portal:Soviet Union

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS

Introduction

Coat of arms of the Soviet Union 1
Coat of arms of the Soviet Union 1
The flag of the Soviet Union
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. During its existence, it was the largest country by area, extending across eleven time zones and sharing borders with twelve countries, and the third-most populous country. An overall successor to the Russian Empire, it was nominally organized as a federal union of national republics, the largest and most populous of which was the Russian SFSR. In practice, its government and economy were highly centralized. As a one-party state governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), it was a flagship communist state. Its capital and largest city was Moscow.

The Soviet Union's roots lay in the October Revolution of 1917. The new government, led by Vladimir Lenin, established the Russian SFSR, the world's first constitutionally socialist state. The revolution was not accepted by all within the Russian Republic, resulting in the Russian Civil War. The Russian SFSR and its subordinate republics were merged into the Soviet Union in 1922. Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power, inaugurating rapid industrialization and forced collectivization that led to significant economic growth but contributed to a famine between 1930 and 1933 that killed millions. The Soviet forced labour camp system of the Gulag was expanded. During the late 1930s, Stalin's government conducted the Great Purge to remove opponents, resulting in mass death, imprisonment, and deportation. In 1939, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany signed a nonaggression pact, but in 1941, Germany invaded the Soviet Union in the largest land invasion in history, opening the Eastern Front of World War II. The Soviets played a decisive role in defeating the Axis powers, suffering an estimated 27 million casualties, which accounted for most Allied losses. In the aftermath of the war, the Soviet Union consolidated the territory occupied by the Red Army, forming satellite states, and undertook rapid economic development which cemented its status as a superpower.

Geopolitical tensions with the United States led to the Cold War. The American-led Western Bloc coalesced into NATO in 1949, prompting the Soviet Union to form its own military alliance, the Warsaw Pact, in 1955. Neither side engaged in direct military confrontation, and instead fought on an ideological basis and through proxy wars. In 1953, following Stalin's death, the Soviet Union undertook a campaign of de-Stalinization under Nikita Khrushchev, which saw reversals and rejections of Stalinist policies. This campaign caused tensions with Communist China. During the 1950s, the Soviet Union expanded its efforts in space exploration and took a lead in the Space Race with the first artificial satellite, the first human spaceflight, the first space station, and the first probe to land on another planet. In 1985, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to reform the country through his policies of glasnost and perestroika. In 1989, various countries of the Warsaw Pact overthrew their Soviet-backed regimes, and nationalist and separatist movements erupted across the Soviet Union. In 1991, amid efforts to preserve the country as a renewed federation, an attempted coup against Gorbachev by hardline communists prompted the largest republics—Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus—to secede. On 26 December, Gorbachev officially recognized the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Boris Yeltsin, the leader of the Russian SFSR, oversaw its reconstitution into the Russian Federation, which became the Soviet Union's successor state; all other republics emerged as fully independent post-Soviet states.

During its existence, the Soviet Union produced many significant social and technological achievements and innovations. It had the world's second-largest economy and largest standing military. An NPT-designated state, it wielded the largest arsenal of nuclear weapons in the world. As an Allied nation, it was a founding member of the United Nations as well as one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. Before its dissolution, the Soviet Union was one of the world's two superpowers through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, global diplomatic and ideological influence (particularly in the Global South), military and economic strengths, and scientific accomplishments. (Full article...)
Entries here consist of Good and Featured articles, which meet a core set of high editorial standards.

All ministry seals of the Soviet Union used the State Emblem

The Ministry of Justice of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) (Russian: Министерство юстиции СССР, Ministerstvo Yustitsii SSSR), formed on 15 March 1946, was one of the most important government offices in the Soviet Union. It was formerly (until 1946) known as the People's Commissariat for Justice (Russian: Народный комиссариат юстиции, Narodniy Komissariat Yustitsi'i) abbreviated as Наркомюст (Narkomiust or sometimes known in English as "Narkomyust"). The Ministry, at the All-Union (USSR-wide) level, was established in the 1936 Soviet Constitution, and was in turn based upon the People's Commissariat for Justice of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) formed in 1917, with the latter becoming subordinate, along with the other republican Narkomyusts, to the Union-level People's Commissariat of Justice of the USSR. The Ministry was led by the Minister of Justice, prior to 1946 a Commissar, who was nominated by the Chairman of the Council of Ministers and confirmed by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, and was a member of the Council of Ministers.

The Ministry of Justice was responsible for courts, prisons, and probations. Further responsibilities included criminal justice policy, sentencing policy, and prevention of re-offending in the USSR. The Ministry was organised into All-Union and Union departments. The All-Union level ministries were divided into separate organisations in the Republican, Autonomous Oblast, and provincial level. The leadership of the Ministry of Justice came from notable Soviet law organisations from around the country. (Full article...)

List of recognized articles

Selected picture

Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Credit: L. Léonidov

Vladimir Lenin was the first leader of the Soviet Union.

Did you know... - show different entries

  • ... that because Leonid Brezhnev had more than 200 decorations, it was decided to break the Soviet custom of featuring only one decoration on cushions during his funeral?

Selected quote

Georgy Zhukov, reported in "TOP GENERAL: ZHUKOV". Time. 1955. Retrieved 3 January 2012.

WikiProjects

Selected biography - show another

Pavlov in 1991

Valentin Sergeyevich Pavlov (Russian: Валéнтин Серге́евич Па́влов; 26 September 1937 – 30 March 2003) was a Soviet official who became a Russian banker following the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Born in the city of Moscow, then part of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, Pavlov began his political career in the Ministry of Finance in 1959. Later, during the Brezhnev Era, he became head of the Financial Department of the State Planning Committee. Pavlov was appointed to the post of Chairman of the State Committee on Prices during the Gorbachev Era, and later became Minister of Finance in Nikolai Ryzhkov's second government. He went on to succeed Ryzhkov as head of government in the newly established post of Prime Minister of the Soviet Union.

As Prime Minister Pavlov initiated the 1991 Soviet monetary reform, commonly referred to as the Pavlov reform, in early 1991. Early on he told the media that the reform was initiated to halt the flow of Soviet rubles transported to the Soviet Union from abroad. Although ridiculed at the time, the statement was later proven to be true. In June the same year, Pavlov called for a transfer of power from the President of the Soviet Union to the Prime Minister and the Cabinet of Ministers. When that failed, he joined a plot to oust Gorbachev. In August, he participated in the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, which tried to prevent the disintegration of the Soviet Union. Pavlov was arrested for his involvement in the coup and went on to work in the banking sector in post-Soviet Russia. He can be seen as the last legitimate Soviet head of government since his successor, Ivan Silayev, was appointed by the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic in breach of what were the Soviet constitutional principles. (Full article...)

General images

The following are images from various Soviet Union-related articles on Wikipedia.

Selected anniversaries for December

More Did you know (auto generated)

Recognized content

A-Class articles

Good articles

Former good articles

Good article nominees

Did you know? articles

In the News articles

Picture of the day pictures


(SCROLL)

Main topics

Categories

Category puzzle
Category puzzle
Select [►] to view subcategories

Things you can do

Things you can do Привет and welcome! Wikipedia is the encyclopedia that anyone can edit. If you are interested in the Soviet Union and have some information that can be added to an existing article, please help. Here are some things you can do:

Associated Wikimedia

The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:

Soviet Union in the news

No recent news

Wikiproject Russia information

Sources

Discover Wikipedia using portals

Purge server cache