Soviet coup plotter Yanayev dies at 73

MOSCOW – Gennady Yanayev, a leader of the abortive 1991 Soviet coup who briefly declared himself president replacing Mikhail Gorbachev, has died at age 73, Russia's Communist Party announced Friday.

In one of the indelible images of the putsch that hastened the collapse of the Soviet Union, Yanayev's hands shook visibly as he announced that he was taking over as president. Yanayev was later quoted by a newspaper as saying he was drunk when he signed the decree elevating himself from the vice-presidency.

A statement from the party said Yanayev died Friday after an unspecified lengthy illness. The news website RBK said he died in the Kremlin-run Central Clinical Hospital, citing the Russian International Academy of Tourism, where Yanayev once taught.

Yanayev was one of 12 members of the so-called State Emergency Committee that announced Gorbachev was being replaced on Aug. 19, 1991. Gorbachev was on a short holiday in the Crimea at the time.

Gorbachev was the one who made Yanayev number two, he’s the one who brought in the other hard liners. And Gorbachev was the one who sent the tanks into Lithuania to crush the independence movement.

I do not believe the spin. I do not believe Gorbachev was blind-sided by the failed Soviet crackdown in Moscow, the one that ended the USSR. I do not believe he was the gentle dictator that is protrayed in the media.

I think Gorbachev and his hardliner allies wanted to try the “stalin approach” after his reforms did not save the Soviet economy and prevent the loss of the Warsaw Pact countries. “Gorbi, help us,” they chanted in the streets of Berlin. It was not out of respect.

The people of East Berlin, who would only weeks later tear down the wall, were mocking Gorbachev when he visited East Germany. The iron curtain collapsed in Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Romania, etc. And the CCCP in Moscow was in trouble.

Gorbachev was in the Crimea “on holiday” because he was not sure how it would go when they sent the tanks into Moscow to try and crush the Russian independence protests. He did not want to end up like Ceausescu. Only when Yeltsin promised to protect his life, did Gorbachev come back to Moscow.

I am convinced that the deal was cut before Gorbachev got on the plane back to Moscow. Yeltsin let Gorbachev flee to the U.S. and to protect the lives of the hard liners, including Yanayev, only in return for ending the Soviet Union, which Grobachev did in December 1991.

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