History of Russia - Chapter 53 : Boris Yeltsin (1991–1999)

Описание: 🕰️🇷🇺 Welcome back to History of Russia — and to one of the wildest, loudest, most unpredictable chapters of the 20th century. In History of Russia - Chapter 53 : Boris Yeltsin (1991–1999) we follow the dramatic birth of the Russian Federation after the Soviet Union’s collapse, and the stormy presidency of the man who stood on a tank and then tried to steer a country through economic shock, political chaos, and war.

✨ What’s inside this episode?

🔻 The Soviet Union unravels (1990–1991)
We set the scene as the USSR weakens, republics push for sovereignty, and Moscow’s authority fractures. Yeltsin rises as a populist outsider within the system, then becomes the face of resistance during the August 1991 coup attempt. The coup fails, the Communist Party’s grip breaks, and by December 1991 the Soviet Union dissolves — leaving Russia to inherit enormous institutions, debts, arsenals, and expectations.

⚙️ A new Russia… at shock speed
Russia’s economy is flipped almost overnight. “Shock therapy” reforms mean price liberalization, rapid privatization, and a painful transition from planned economy to markets. 🏭➡️💸 The result? Inflation surges, savings vanish, factories struggle, inequality widens, and a new class of power brokers emerges: the oligarchs. We explore how vouchers, loans-for-shares deals, and insider networks reshaped ownership — and public trust.

🏛️ Power vs. Parliament (1992–1993)
The young state fights over who rules Russia and how. Tension between Yeltsin and the legislature escalates into the 1993 constitutional crisis, ending with armed confrontation in Moscow and a decisive shift toward a strong presidency. A new constitution is approved, but the price is heavy: a democracy still being born learns early how fragile it is.

🗳️ Elections, media, and survival politics (1996)
Yeltsin’s popularity collapses — yet he wins re-election in 1996, in a campaign shaped by money, media, fear of a communist return, and raw political calculation. 📺🧩 We look at how “managed democracy” begins to take form, and how power increasingly depends on alliances with business elites and security structures.

⚔️ Chechnya and the cost of force (1994–1996)
One of the darkest arcs of the decade: the First Chechen War. From the decision to use force, to the brutal urban fighting in Grozny, to the uneasy settlement, we trace how the war scarred the military, the public, and the legitimacy of the state.

🌍 Russia and the world
As the Cold War ends, Russia searches for a new role: relations with the U.S. and Europe, arguments over NATO enlargement, diplomacy in the post-Soviet space, and the constant pressure of debt, loans, and economic “rescue” packages. 🤝💣

💥 1998: The crash
The decade’s stress fractures finally snap: the 1998 financial crisis brings default, a collapsing ruble, and political whiplash. Markets panic, wages go unpaid, and ordinary people are forced to rebuild their lives again — while the elite scrambles to keep control. 📉🧱

🔔 1999: The handover
A second war in the North Caucasus begins, political factions fracture, and a new figure rises quickly: Vladimir Putin. In a final, startling move, Yeltsin resigns on December 31, 1999, handing power to his chosen successor and closing the turbulent first decade of post-Soviet Russia.

🎙️ This chapter is a story of dizzying freedom and crushing uncertainty — of reforms and corruption, hope and fear, elections and emergency decrees. If you want to understand how modern Russia was forged, this is the decade you can’t skip.

🧭 Life in the 1990s
Beyond Kremlin drama, we glance at daily Russia: kiosks and “shuttle traders” 🛍️, unpaid wages and barter deals, the spread of privatized TV and loud talk shows 📺, and the shadow world of protection rackets and organized crime 🕶️💵. New freedoms arrive with new anxieties — and many families feel they’re rebuilding from scratch.

🧱 Institutions from rubble
Russia builds a new parliament (the State Duma), rewrites legal codes, and wrestles with regions bargaining for autonomy. Governments change fast: Viktor Chernomyrdin, Sergei Kiriyenko, and Yevgeny Primakov each try to steady the ship as the state struggles to collect taxes and control corruption. 🗂️⏳

🕊️ A brief thaw, then the storm
By the late 1990s inflation slows and diplomacy attempts a reset (including the 1997 Russia–NATO Founding Act), but weak banks and heavy borrowing keep the system brittle — setting up the crash and the hard pivot that follows. ⚖️🔥

👉 If you enjoyed the episode, drop your thoughts below: Was Yeltsin a necessary reformer, a reckless gambler, or both?

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