REVOLUTIONS OF 1989 AND THE END OF THE COLD WAR
The article considers the relationship between two phenomena that appeared at the end of the twentieth century - the revolutions of 1989 in the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the end of the Cold War. Using documents on the foreign policy of the USSR, the author proves that not the revolutions themselves are an act completing the US-Soviet confrontation, but the lack of desire from the side of the Soviet authorities to keep these states in the orbit of socialism. The rejection of the “Brezhnev doctrine” not only in words but in deeds became a signal to the entire world community that the Soviet Union intends to put an end to more than 40 years of confrontation. The author believes that the declaration following the meeting in Malta, as well as the joint statement of the ATS countries to condemn the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 complete a series of 1989 events in Europe that had a direct impact on the completion of the confrontation between the USSR and the USA. The author notes the presence of a Eurocentric approach to the study of the ﬁnal stage of the Cold War.