1. Brezhnev’s Economic and Political Strangulation Xaina Vega

2. Leonid Brezhnev He succeeded Nikita Kruschev on 14 October 1964. He was the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He combined the positions of General Secretary and Chair.

3. Economic Stagnation Standards of living started to increase and then began to reverse More money was being funded to the space program and military program 25% of Soviet GNP from 1964-1982 was spent solely on the military

4. Conditions is the USSR In 1972 and 1975 the USSR suffered from poor harvest In the 1970s the rest of the world was suffering from a petroleum shortage The people started to criticise the government

5. Conditions in the USSR Allowed farmers to work on state owned plots Previously Collectivization had been the policy Brezhnev tried to increase production in the ninth and tenth five year plans but this was not with much success Consumer turned to the black market to find products

6. Living Standard Had many failed agricultural policies that plagued the USSR. From 1953-1970 the USSR saw an increased standard of living, but under Brezhnev it began to go sour, the standard of living decreased

7. Censorship Censorship and repression Citizens started to voice their disapproval Intellectuals were starting to publicly criticise the government Solzhenitsyn published The Gulag Archipelago However he was exiled for his work in 1974

8. Citizen Disapproval Samizdat and Tamizdat were used to voice opinion and spread ideas Samizdat where self published pamphlets or articles that were illegally copied and distributed There was also pressure from abroad to allow the Soviet Jews to leave the USSR and move to Israel if the Soviet Jews wanted to do so

9. Politics Brezhnev did not have much interest in reforming the government or the Party structure It became more and more apparent that there was a need for a reform as the leaders where ageing and starting to die "stability of cadres" Workers also realised that they would not lose their jobs due to poor productivity Even though this brought about a sense of security it had devastating effects on the economy

10. Foreign Reforms and Problems: Brezhnev Doctrine The Soviet Union wanted to come to an agreement on arms limitation with the USA Main interest was to maintain When the Czechoslovak government introduced reforms that went against the communist regime Soviet troops invaded the country and reversed the reforms In November 1968 the Brezhnev Doctrine The Western powers criticised this

11. Agreement with the USA Due to the economic situation in the USSR Brezhnev wanted to come to an agreement with the USA on arm limitations This also showed the U.S that the USSR wanted to avoid nuclear war In 1969 the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks began between the Brezhnev and the USA president Nixon In May 1972 the USA and the USSR came to an agreement on arm limitations The Helsinki Final Act in 1975 finalised the post-war frontiers in Central and Eastern Europe and the Soviets agreed to comply with international conventions on human rights

12. Involvement in Africa and the Solidarity Movement The Portuguese withdrew Civil war in Mozambique and Angola Assistance of first the Cubans and then the Soviets The Soviets supported the Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola and the Frelimo in Mozambique since the 1960s The Soviets also helped put an end to regime of Haile Selassie in Ethiopia The Somali government was against this received arms from the Soviets The Solidarity movement started in the late 1970s in Poland The USSR wanted to invoke the Brezhnev Doctrine however due to its involvement in Afghanistan it was reluctant to do so

13. The USSR's Involvement in Afghanistan Since the late 19th century the USSR had intervened in Afghanistan The USSR wanted to compete with Britain for power in Afghanistan The Soviets had sent military support to the country to aid the removal of the British control The USSR military had trained Afghan officers which made them supportive of the Marxist cause in their own country The Afghan army took power in 1978 and killed the president and prime minister Nur Muhammad Taraki became the president of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan (DRA) and put in power the Marxist People's Democratic

14. Afghanistan This was the start of a ten year intervention in Afghanistan which cost the USSR many lives and billions of dollars The Soviet citizens were against this intervention and it also resulted in international condemnation The US limited grain sales to the USSR and also boycotted the 1980 summer Olympics which were due to be held in Moscow The rebels received the support from the US and President Carter allowed the CIA to conduct operations in Afghanistan By 1982 the USSR realised that it could not win the war in Afghanistan but it refused to admit defeat Instead it continued a war that was costly and very unpopular as it had invoked the Brezhnev Doctrine and could not withdraw

15. Chernenko and Andropov As Brezhnev got older and weaker he relied more and more on his protégé Konstantin Chernenko to lead the country It was thought that Chernenko would succeed Brezhnev however when Brezhnev died in November 1982 he was succeeded by Yuri Andropov Andropov was a former KGB leader and a Central Committee member He managed to out maneuver Chernenko and became the leader of the USSR

16. Chernenko and Andropov Andropov wanted to change the USSR's economic stagnation He tried to nullify the "stability of cadres" to improve productivity He tried to answer the problem of economic stagnation by putting in places policies which stated that those illegally absent from work would be arrested He also closed down most of the Soviet space program in 1983 to try and cut down expenses He wanted to get rid of Brezhnev's and Chernenko's followers and replace them with political elites who were loyal to him and were willing to encourage change within the economy He wanted to replace the older Party members with younger ones with the help of Mikhail Gorbachev Foreign problems which had started during the Brezhnev era continued The situation in Afghanistan worsened

17. Chernenko and Andropov September 1983 the Soviets shot down a Korean Airlines flight that had strayed into Soviet airspace In 1983 Andropov's health deteriorated and he stopped appearing in public He wanted Gorbachev to succeed him however when Andropov died in 1984 he was succeeded by Chernenko There were not many changes under Chernenko's leadership, foreign and domestic policies stayed the same Chernenko’s health deteriorated quite fast and he needed to rely more and more on his deputy Gorbachev When Chernenko died in March 1985 it marked the end of the Brezhnev era

18. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9i_occHfLvI

19. Analyze the political cartoon and what it is saying about the position of the USSR during Brezhnev’s reign as leader.