From Brezhnev To Gorbachev

From 1982 to 1985, the period on which this book focuses, the Soviet Union was governed by a succession of ailing old men—Brezhnev, Andropov, and Chernenko—who, supported by an equally elderly Politburo, were often physically incapable of controlling and directing the bureaucratic state machine and party organization. This unprecedented situation precipitated a secret and bitter power struggle within the top Soviet leadership between two main factions: the Chernenko apparatchiks, who had risen t