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Dashed edge = started before, or continues beyond, this day
Events on Monday 11 March 1985 1
1985 – 1991Gorbachev in powerGlasnost, Perestroika and the collapse of the USSR — 1985 to 1991Gorbachev became Soviet leader on March 11, 1985 and resigned on December 25, 1991, the day the Soviet Union was dissolved. His reforms of glasnost (openness) and perestroika (restructuring) inadvertently unleashed forces that ended the Cold War and dissolved the USSR.