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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
World
Julian Borger in Washington

How Gorbachev’s political legacy was destroyed by Putin

Russia's President Vladimir Putin, right, talks with former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev at the start of a news conference in Schleswig, northern Germany, in 2004.
Russia's President Vladimir Putin, right, with ex-Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev at the start of a news conference in Schleswig, northern Germany, in 2004. Photograph: Carsten Rehder/AP

Mikhail Gorbachev lived long enough to see everything he had tried to achieve crumble or get blown up.

The era of detente and arms control between Washington and Moscow has been replaced by a bloody war in Ukraine in which US and Nato weaponry is being pitted against Russian forces with the accompanying risk of a direct clash between the nuclear superpowers by accident or miscalculation.

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