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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Charlesgray109" data-source="post: 3846333" data-attributes="member: 56575">How far back to you want do go?  A major, MAJOR turning point was the removal of Kruschev, who in some respects was trying to do what Gorbachev did decades earlier.      The problem is, the Afghan war didn't kill the USSR, but it did show what had been known by many people for decades before-- communism was destroying their economy, the "five year plans" were based on lie after lie, (in one case, an ENTIRE FACTORY that had been mentioned as producing materials never actually existed) and the state was completely unable to keep up technologically with the US.  A Kruschev dominated soviet Union, say if he had been in for twenty years after he was deposed in our "Real world" might have been considerably different-- still communist, but open enough that some of the major problems that brought it down never would have gotten to the size they did.  A more liberal USSR wouldn't have faced the brain drain it did, or in all likely hood, the ethnic tension that marked the 1990's.</blockquote>