The RED FILES timeline is coded for educators, teachers and students according to the following:

1857

Konstantin Tsiolkovsky born near Riazan, Russia

1865

Jules Verne publishes From the Earth to the Moon

1869

Dmitri Mendeleev creates Periodic Table of the Elements

1870

22 April, Vladimir Il'cih Ul'ianov (Lenin) born.

1879

21 December, Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili (Stalin) born in Gori, Georgia

1881

Terrorists assassinate Tsar Aleksander II. Pogroms sweep Russia as Jews blamed; start massive refugee movement to USA

1881

Nikolai Kibalich writes about space flight by jet propulsion while in Sts. Peter & Paul Fortress awaiting execution for plotting to kill the Tsar

1883

Tsiolkovsky writes Free Space on use of jet propulsion in vacuum of space

1895

Tsiolkovsky write Dream of the Earth and Sky describes earth satellites in 200hundred mile up orbits inhabited by 'sky-dwellers'

1896

Henri Becquerel 'discovers' radioactivity in Paris.

1896

Athens First modern Olympic Games

1898

Minsk Russian Social Democratic Workers Party Founded

1900-1905

Munich, London, Geneva Lenin edits, writes for and fights for control of underground party newspaper, Iskra (The Spark)

1900

Paris Second modern Olympic Games

1903

Igor Kurchatov director USSR atomic research born

1903

Tsiolkovsky writes "Exploring Space by Reactive [Rocket] Devices" virtual handbook on practical rocketry, including propellants, rocket shape, rocket nozzle for focusing force" (later edition mention atomic and solar energy)

1903

Brussels-London Russian Social Democratic Workers Party splits into Bolshevik and Menshevik factions.

1904

St. Louis III Olympic Games

1905

First Russian revolution. Scientists join movement for basic freedoms

1905

Albert Einstein write Theory of Relativity. E=Mc2.

1906

Sergei Korolev born in Zhitomir, Ukraine

1908

London IV Olympic Games

1911

Vladimir Vernadsky, Russian Scientists, prompts expedition to find and to chart deposits of Russian radioactive materials.

1912

Pravda (Truth) Bolshevik Party Newspaper founded in St.Petersburg. Boris Yeltsin orders Pravda fall 1991. It resumes publication shortly but after 1993 no longer is paper of the Communist Party.

1908

Stockholm V Olympic Games

1914

Start of First World War

1917

February, revolution. Tsar abdicates. Revolution brings liberal democrats to power.

1917

3 April, Lenin returns from exile in Switzerland on "sealed train" provided by German government.

1917

October, revolution. Bolsheviks come to power.

1917

Bolsheviks organize Council of People's Commissars to Govern Russia. Lenin elected Chairman

9 November, Bolsheviks suppress Liberal and right-wing newspapers. Pravda publishes Tsarist secret Treaties.

1917

December, Cheka created. Forerunner of NKVD, KGB

1918

13 April. Bolshevik (and former Menshevik) leader Leon Trotsky appointed Commissar of War as civil war starts full force.

1918

4 May, Russia signs Armistice with Germany

1918

28 June, Bolshevik Government nationalizes large industry

1918

16 July, Bolsheviks execute ex-Tsar and family in Ekaterinburg to prevent them from being rescued and becoming propaganda symbols for anti-Bolshevik forces. News suppressed.

1918

2 August, American and British Troops occupy Archangel

1918

14 August, British troop land in Baku

1918

14 October, Traditional Moscow-Petrograd Football (soccer) Game revived.

1919

15 April, Cheka opens labor camps, GULAG for enemies of Bolshevik government

1919

October, Fearing spread of disease 'Bolshevism' Allies impose economic coastal blockade in attempt to isolate and to smother Soviet Russia

1920

January, Allies lift economic coastal blockade because they see it is ineffective.

1920

Antwerp VII Olympic Games (No Soviet Russia participation)

1921

23 July, Herbert Hoover, Chairman of the American Relief Agency offers to feed starving Russian people. Lenin's government accepts.

1922

3 April, Stalin becomes general secretary of the Communist Party

1922

26 May, Lenin suffers first paralytic Stroke.

1922

24 December, Lenin writes last testament warns against rude Stalin getting too much power. Document suppressed.

1923

9 March, Lenin suffers third stroke. No longer can speak.

1923

First Physical Culture Day

1924

21 January, Lenin dies

1924

31 January, Constitution of Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ratified.

1924

Great Britain, Italy, France, Sweden recognize USSR

1924

Paris VIII Olympic Games (No Soviet Union participation)

1926

November, riot in Odessa at Moscow-Odessa Football (soccer) Game

1927

Stalin consolidates hold on Communist Party. Outfights Trotsky, expels many Trotsky followers from Party.

1928-1932

First Five Year Plan

1928

Dinamo Stadium Built in Moscow

1928

August, First Spartakiad (Soviet style Olympic-type multi-sports competition)

1928-1932

Nikolai Rynin writes a nine volume Russian encyclopedia of space travel

1928

Sergei Korolev designs glider enters in nationwide competition

1929

1 October, Stalin introduces first Five Year Plan of Economic Development

1929

Forced Collectivization of Agriculture

1929

Stalin celebrates consolidation of power; orders forced collectivization

1929

Communist Party of the United States founded

1929

29 October, Wall Street Crashes. Depression begins.

1930

Group for Studying Reaction Propulsion (GIRD) lead by Friedrikh Tsander begins working on OR-1 liquid fueled rocket engine. Korolev devotes all spare time to project.

1931

Pavlik Morozov denounces father.

1931

First Physical Culture Day Parade in Red Square

1932

Pavlik Morozov and his brother murdered. Show trial in their village.

1932

Pavlik Morozov legend born of young boy denouncing father for hoard grain.

1932 23

April, Central Committee abolishes all artists and writers groups. Subsequently new Union of Writers formed.

1932

Los Angles X Olympic Games

1933

17 August, GIRD-09 successfully launched USSR first liquid-fueled rocket

1933

16 November, United States and USSR establish diplomatic relations.

1934

8 June, Soviet government issues law on "Betrayal of Motherland" death penalty obligatory for treason; law holds family members collectively responsible for violations of law.

1934

Tsiolkovsky finishes ten-year effort to write Space Rocket Trains math based treatise on techniques for designing multi-staged rockets

1934

Julius Rosenberg enters City College of New York; attracted to vibrant radical politics movement.

1934

1 December, Sergei Kirov, popular Communist leader of Leningrad murdered. Stalin suspected of organizing murder which sets off Great Purges and Great Terror (hence the expression "the great 1937 terror began 1 December, 1934)

1935

Lona Cohen joins U.S. Communist Party; Morris Cohen joins Communist party works as party organizer in the Bronx

1935-1938

Great Purge, Purge Trials, Great Terror. GULAG swells.

1936

21 June, formation All-Union Committee on Physical Culture and Sports

1936

19-24 August, first "show trial" of Stalinist purges.

1936-1939

Civil War in Spain; USSR backs republic, USA neutral; Abraham Lincoln Brigade of Volunteers fights for Republic. Morris Cohen wounded. . NKVD agents recruit Cohen.

1936

Berlin XI Olympic Games (Soviet Union Absent)

1937

27 June, NKVD agents take Sergei Korolev. 10 year sentence to Gulag in Kolyma

1937

July, Lona meets Morris Cohen at Madison Square Garden anti-fascist rally

1938

February, Morris Cohen goes to NKVD school outside Barcelona. Learns tradecraft

1938

Enrico Fermi wins Nobel Prize for developments in Nuclear physics.

1939

23 August, Secret Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression pact signed.

1939

Start of World War II in Europe. Nazi Germany invades Poland

1939

Albert Einstein writes letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt warning that Nazi Germany is building an Atomic Bomb - lays groundwork for Manhattan Project

1939

1940

Igor Kurchatov reports on nuclear chain reactions at Academy of Sciences, Moscow

1940

September, Korolev moved to Tupolev sharashka on Radio Street, Moscow

1941

22 June, Nazi Germany invades USSR

1941

24 June, President Roosevelt pledges US aid to Soviet Union.

1941

Klaus Fuchs offers to spy for the USSR; his case officer - Aleksander Feklisov

1941

7 December, Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor US joins war.

1941-42

NKVD chief Lavrenty Beria reviews captured information Nazi are planning atomic bomb.

1942

Lona Cohen works in war plants; acts as clandestine courier.

1942

USSR and Great Britain sign 20 year mutual assistance treaty.

1942

August. Manhattan Project authorized. British agents inform Moscow of joint US-British project. Stalin informed. Operation ENORMOUS begins.

1942

September, Ted Hall enters Harvard. Hall joins John Reed Society (named for American Communist and reporter buried by the Kremlin wall). Hall breezes through physics curriculum

1942

September, Battle of Stalingrad.starts. Turning point in ground war.

1942

December, Fermi conducts First Controlled Nuclear Chain Reaction in Squash Court at University of Chicago.

1943

Spymaster Feklisov starts meeting Julius Rosenberg.

1943

Venona Project starts trying to crack Soviet code (succeed by late 1948)

1943

October, Harvard Professor recommends 18-year-old whiz kid Hall for Manhattan Project.

1943

28 November-1 December, Stalin, Roosevelt, Churchill summit in Tehran, Iran

1944

January, Hall arrives at Los Alamos. Issued security clearances without problem by War Department.

1944

June, Korolev and entire Tupolev sharashka design crew freed; charges officially expunged.

1944

July, David Greenglass selected to work as technician at Los Alamos.

1944

13 July, Winston Churchill ask Stalin's help investigating German rockets bombarding London. Stalin promises to personally have it investigated.

1944

5 August, Soviet Rocket experts with British colleagues in occupied Germany/Poland investigate partially destroyed German rockets.

1944

9-20 October, Moscow. Churchill meets with Stalin. Divide Europe into hypothetical spheres of influence. Agree to pursue joint policy in Yugoslavia..

1944

Nov-Dec?? Hall gives Harvard College roommate Los Alamos secret document for transmission to Moscow.

1945

Winter - Lona Cohen makes courier run for ENORMOUS

1945

4-11 February, "Big Three" Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin meet at Yalta set up occupation zones in Germany, agree to include non-Communists in governments of Poland and Yugoslavia. Discuss post-war spheres of influence.

1945

5 March, Kurchatov reads ENORMOUS raw data on 'implosion' technique for A-bomb detonation

1945

March-April, Lona Cohen meets ENORMOUS spymaster Anatoly Yatskov and backup Aleksandr Feklisov in NYC coffeeshop.

1945

April, Russian experts systematic effort to collect German V-2 hardware, blueprints, engineers and technicians. Salvage destroyed parts from garbage.

1945

April, publication of photographs of Buchenwald Concentration Camp in Life Magazine said to have profound impact on Los Alamos scientists.

1945

April-May, Lona Cohen travels to meet Ted Hall on campus of University of New Mexico. Hides documents on A-bomb in Kleenex Box takes them back on train to ENORMOUS agents in NYC.

1945

12 April, President Roosevelt dies. Vice-President Harry S. Truman sworn in as President.

1945

summer Korolev commissioned colonel in Red Army; flies to Germany to gather information and parts of Nazi Wernher von Braun's V-2 rocket program

1945

9 May, War Against Germany Ends. Victory Day Declared.

1945

13 May, Soviet national football (soccer) championship league resumes after war.

1945

June, Klaus Fuchs transmits detailed report on Los Alamos developments

1945

June, ENORMOUS courier Harry Gold meets David Greenglass in Albuquerque, N.M.

1945

16 July, World's First Atomic Bomb Test, "Trinity" Alamogordo, New Mexico

1945

4 July, Potsdam summit. President Truman tells Stalin, "We had a new weapon of unusual destructive force." Stalin nods head says, "Thank you."

1945

August, U.S. drops "Fat Boy" Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima, Japan

8 August, Soviet Union declares war on Japan.

1945

9 August, U.S. drops "Thin Man" Atomic Bomb on Nagasaki, Japan

14 August, Japan agrees to unconditional surrender.

1945

20 August, Stalin orders Beria to chair a Special Committee under the Defense Committee to supervise all work on the use of atomic energy of uranium

1945

23 August, Soviet consul in Tokyo inspects Hiroshima bomb damage

1945

September, David Greenglass passes drawing Atomic Bomb lense designs to Julius Rosenberg for handing over to ENORMOUS agent.

1945

6 November, First Public Mention of Soviet Atomic Program in Bolshevik Revolution Anniversary Speech by Stalin's lieutenant V. Molotov, "...we will achieve prosperity in our country. We will have atomic energy too, and much else!"

1945

25 January, Stalin summons Kurchatov orders him "Build the bomb on a Russian Scale."

1946

February, Cohens go inactive "cold storage" Morris enrolls in Columbia University Teachers College on G.I. Bill

1946

February, Canadian-style hockey rink set up in Moscow.

1946

5 March, Winston Churchill makes "IRON CURTAIN Speech

1946

25 December, Kurchatov supervises Physical-1 nuclear pile successful chain reaction.

1947

Lona meets new Soviet agent at Bronx zoo. Returns to work as courier.

1947

17 February, U.S. starts anti-Communist radio broadcasts into USSR CIA sponsored effort originally called "Radio Liberation from Communism/Bolshevism" Becomes Radio Liberty.

1947

14 April, Stalin summons Korolev to meeting commission planning rocket development. Korolev reports time for Stalin ordered reworking V-2 Nazi rocket past; time for systematic development Soviet ICBM

1948

February, Klaus Fuchs meets Feklisov in London

1948

London XIV Summer Olympics resume after WWII (Soviet Union sends observers)

1948 late

Venona Project cracks enough Soviet code to start reading words.

1948

18 June, Soviets begin economic blockade of Westerns zones of Berlin

1948

21 June, US, Britain, France begin Berlin airlift

1948

July, CIA Director memo "the earliest date by which it is remotely possible that the USSR May, have completed its first atomic bomb is mid-1950...more probable date mid-1953

1949

29 August, USSR tests its first atomic bomb at special site in Kazakhstan

1949

September, US 'sniffer planes'detect unusual radiation

1949

23 September, President Truman announces "We have evidence that within recent weeks an Atomic explosion occurred in the USSR."

1949

18 October, Second Soviet atomic test

1949

Mao proclaims Communist victory in China; People's Republic of China proclaimed

1950

21 January, Alger Hiss convicted of perjury for denying he passed secret documents to Communist agent .

1950

22 January, Stalin in meeting with Mao asks PRC to set up a joint global network of espionage agents among Chinese living abroad.

1950

2 February, Klaus Fuchs arrested in Britain; confesses to atomic spying.

1950

9 February, Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-Wisc) says he has list of 205 members of the Communist party in the State Dept.

1950

February, spy hunt, commie hunt mania envelopes FBI and nation

1950

March, Cohens receive message to lay low and prepare to defect

1950

April, Stalin backs North Korean invasion of South Korea

1950

22 May, Fuch courier, Harry Gold confesses; later names David Greenglass as a contact.

1950

15 June, Greenglass names his brother-in-law Julius Rosenberg as the man who recruited him to spy for the Soviet Union.

1950

16 June, FBI interviews Rosenberg for the first time. Member of Rosenberg electronic spy ring, Joel Barr disappears in Paris (goes to Czechoslovkia, later settles in Soviet Union)

1950

25 June, North Korean army, equipped by Soviet Union crosses 38^th parallel; invasion marks start of Korean war.

1950

end of June, Cohens ordered to leave the country; they make up a 'cover' story about moving to California - trek across ten or more countries arrive in Moscow November, 1950.

1951

31 January, Federal Grand Jury indites Rosenbergs, David Greenglass.

1951

6 March, Rosenberg trial begins end 29 March, Guilty

1951

5 April, Judge Kaufman imposes death sentence on Rosenbergs; appeals follow.

1951

Cohens go to tradecraft school in Poland

1952

16 January, Soviet government orders foreign diplomats and journalists restricted to staying within 25 miles of Kremlin; bars them from 22 cities.

1952

Helsinki XV Summer Olympic Games Soviet Union Participates for First Time

1952

October, 19^th CP congress drops term "Bolshevik" from party title.

1953

5 March, Stalin dies. Georgii Malenkov succeeds him.

1953

19 June, Rosenbergs executed at Sing Sing Prison.

1953

Lavrenty Beria, secret police and atomic bomb project chief loses Kremlin power struggle; arrested; found guilty of crimes against USSR shot 23 December.

1953

13 September, Nikita Khrushchev takes over as CPSU leader.

1954

Korolev authorized to construct R-7 rocket for ICBM duty.

1954

Soviet Union defeats Canada 7-2 in World Hockey Championships

1951-57

Cohen perform unspecified tasks for KGB behind Iron Curtain and elsewhere (Japan, Hong Kong) including training "illegal" in how to behave like Americans.

1955

14 May, Warsaw Pact formed (USSR, Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania)

1956

14-25 February, 20^th Congress CPSU in secret speech Khrushchev reports & condemns excesses of Stalin's rule.

1956

Moscow First Artificial hockey rink built.

1956

28 March, Pravda denounces abuses of power by Stalin during his latter years.

1956

30 June, Lenin's Last Testament (1924) published for first time.

1956

Melbourne XVI Olympic Games

1956

23 October, Hungarians demonstrate against Soviet troops in their country and puppet Soviet Hungarian government. Start of Hungarian revolt. Radio Free Europe encourages uprising. Soviets eventually send in tanks and troops in November.

1957?

Cohens settle in North London suburb as Australian couple Peter and Helen Kroger.

1957

19 April, Khrushchev government officially rehabilitates Korolev (of Stalin era) "crimes"

1957

21 August, Soviet Union successfully launches world's first ICBM - Korolev's R-7 rocket with dummy warhead goes from Baykonur to Kamchatka 4,000 miles.

1957

US, Canada boycott World Hockey Championships in Moscow to protest Soviet invasion of Hungary.

1957

4 October, SPUTNIK-1 launched

1957

6 October, Pravda banner headline "World's First Artificial Earth Satellite-Created in Soviet Nation."

1957

3 November, SPUTNIK-2 ORBITS Earth with dog Laika aboard.

1958

27 January, US USSR agree to expand cultural, educational, and scientific exchanges.

1958

23 October, Nobel Prize for Literature awarded to Boris Pasternak for novel Dr.Zhivago. Pasternak forced to renounce prize. Dr.Zhivago not published in USSR until 1989.

1958

15 May, 1.3ton SPUTNIK-3 ORBITS Earth full of science equipment. Misses discovering Van Allen radiation belt as tape recorder fails.

1958

29 July, President Eisenhower signs law creating NASA, National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

1959

24 July, "Kitchen Debate" US Vice President Richard M. Nixon and Khrushchev at US Exhibition, Sokolniki Park, Moscow.

1959

12 September, Korolev launches LUNA-2 impacts on MOON. First spacecraft to reach another celestial body.

1959

15-27 Khrushchev tours US, visits President Eisenhower.

1959

4 October, LUNA-3 launched photographs far (dark) side of Moon. First images of far side of moon in human history.

1960

19 August, Vostok capsule launched with 2 dogs BELKA and STRELKA and successfully returned to earth with dogs alive. First MAMMALS, First living Creature to SURVIVE in SPACE and RETURN TO EARTH.

1960

24 October, R-16 Rocket Explosion Disaster 165 killed General Nedelin, head of Soviet Strategic Rocket Forces perishes. COVERED UP

1960

Rome XVII Olympic Games

1961

7 January, Kroger-Cohen arrested for links with their 'cultural' pupil Konon Molody code name Gordon Lonsdale.

1961

9 March, Vostok capsule with dog Chernushka and human dummy successfully launched and recovered after orbiting earth.

1961

12 April, Cosmonaut Yuri Gagrin launched into space make one orbit of earth and lands successfully near Volga river town, Engels. FIRST MAN IN SPACE

1961

5 May, Astronaut Alan Shepard successfully completes sub-orbital space flight. FIRST AMERICAN in space.

1961

6 August, Vostok-2 with Cosmonaut Gherman Titov successfully orbits earth 17 times 25 hour in Space - New Longevity Record.

1962

20 February, Mercury-6 with Astronaut John Glenn aboard orbits earth 3 times. FIRST AMERICAN TO ORBIT EARTH.

1962

24 September, Kremlin orders Korolev to test N-1 rocket to power man to moon by 1965.

1962

22 - 27 October, Cuban Missile Crisis. President Kennedy announces Soviets spotted building missile bases in Cuba.

1963

7 January, Pravda criticizes Communists in China of dogmatic, devisive views.

1963

19 June, Vostok-6 with Cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova aboard successfully orbits earth 48 times. FIRST WOMAN IN SPACE.

1963

20 June, US-USSR agree to HOT LINE linking White House & Kremlin.

1964

2 March, CPSU announces renewed campaign to eliminate religion from Soviet life.

1964

Tokyo XVIII Olympic Games

1964

14 October, Khrushchev ousted from Kremlin. L.Brezhenev and A. Kosygin takeover.

1965

12 March, Voskhod-2 Alexei Leonov performs first "Space Walk".

1966

14 January, Korolev dies in Kremlin Hospital. Identity revealed next day.

1966

14 February, Two Soviet writers (Sinavsky, Daniel) sentenced to hard labor for publishing "anti-Soviet" works abroad. Works are read on Radio Liberty.

1968

December, Apollo-8 commanded by Frank Borman circles Moon.

1968

Summer Liberalization programs of reform Communists, "Prague Spring" raise tensions with increasingly conservative Moscow. Moscow continues prosecuting non-conformist writers for anti-Soviet activities.

1968

Mexico City XIX Olympic Games

1968

August, Soviet tanks & troops invades Czechoslovakia to undo "Socialism with a Human Face" reformist brand of Communism.

1968

26 September, Pravda explains ideological reasons for Czech invasion, "world socialism is indivisible, and its defense is the common cause of all Communists." Kremlin will not allow communism, as it defines it, to be rolled back. "Brezhnev Doctrine."

1969

7 July, N-1 rocket explodes during test. Takes 2 years to rebuild launch pad.

1969

20 July, Neil Armstrong from Apollo-11 is FIRST MAN ON THE MOON. Buzz Aldrin Plants U.S. Flag on Moon.

1972

2 September, Soviet vs Canadian Professional Hockey Series begins in Montreal. Soviets win first game 7-3.

1972

Munich XX Olympic Games - Soviets Triumph. Olga Korbut captures world attention

1974

13 February, Soviet government deports writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn, strips him of Soviet citizenship for books on Stalinism.

1974

2 June, Andrei Sakharov, "father of Soviet H-Bomb" begins hunger strike in support of amnesty for Soviet political prisoners.

1975

17-19 July, USSR & USA conduct joint space activities Apollo & Soyuz spacecraft link up.

1975

9 October, Andrei Sakharov awarded Noble Peace Prize for human rights and civil rights work.

1976

Montreal XXI Olympic Games.

1977

June, L. Brezhnev replaces as N.Podgorny as nominal head of state (chairman of the presidium) First Soviet leader to hold both post of general secretary and president at same time.

1979

27 December, Soviet government under Brezhnev's leadership sends invasion army into Afghanistan to defend socialism there.///Troops withdrawn 15 May, 1988.

1980

20 January, President J. Carter calls Soviet invasion of Afghanistan "most serious threat to peace since the Second World War."

1980

22 January, Andrei Sakharov exiled to closed city Gorky for public opposition to Soviet policies.

1980

April, US announces it will boycott Moscow Olympics

1980

Moscow 19 July, XXII Summer Olympic Games. Brezhnev opens games United States, West Germany and other countries boycott to protest Soviet invasion of Afghanistan

1982

10 November, L. Brezhev dies of heart attack; emergency session of Central Committee selects former KGB head I.Andropov to be general secretary of the CPSU.

1983

1 September, Soviet Fighter planes shoot down Korean Airlines Flight 007 after it strays off course and overflies military base. 269 dead. Pravda admits fact of downing only on 6 September.

1984

9 February, I.Andropov dies of acute kidney problems; K.Chernenko becomes general secretary of CPSU on 13 Feb.

1984

Los Angeles XXIII Summer Olympic Games. Soviet Union cites concerns over 'inadequate security' as reason for boycott - really payback for US boycott of 1980 Moscow games.

1985

10 March, K.Chernenko dies; next day Mikhail Gorbachev announced as the choice for new general secretary of the CPSU.

1985

19-21 Gorbachev-Reagan summit meeting in Geneva.

1985

24 December, Boris Yeltsin named first secretary of Moscow City CP

1986

February, Gorbachev announces policy of Glasnost (openness).

1986

6 March, On last day of 27^th Congress CPSU Gorbachev declares all Soviet citizens must be prepared for "radical transformations in all spheres of Soviet life."

1986

26 April, Accident at Chernobyl Atomic Energy Station. Moscow delays warning its people and world of radiation dangers.

1986

19 December, Gorbachev calls Andrei Sakharov on phone to inform him he is free to leave exile in Gorky.

1987

May, Soviet government stops jamming American radio broadcasts.

1987

21 October, B.Yeltsin criticizes Gorbachev for going to slow in reforms. Within weeks he is dismissed from his party post.

1988

15 May, Soviet troops start withdrawing from Afghanistan.

1988

XXIV Seoul Korea Olympic Games

1989

9 November, Berlin Wall symbol of Cold War torn down.

1990

4 February, hundreds of thousands demonstrate on Moscow streets for democracy and against CP monopoly on power.

1990

12 July, Congress CPSU B.Yeltsin resigns and walks out.

1990

20 December, In Speech to Congress of Peoples Deputies Foreign Minister Eduard Shervernadze warns of approaching dictatorship and resigns his post.

1991

January, Soviet troops seize buildings kill pro-Independence activists in Vilnius Lithuania.

1991

12 June, Yeltsin wins first direct election of Russian President with almost 60% of vote.

1991

19 August, Hard line coup against Gorbachev. Yeltsin calls for a General Strike. Coup collapses on 21 August. Crowds pull down Dzerzhinsky statue in front of Lubyanka. Yeltsin suspends publication of Pravda. Gorbachev resigns as general secretary CPSU.

1991

6 November, Yeltsin bans CP in Russia.

1991

8 December, Yeltsin and leaders Ukraine, Belarus agree to form Commonwealth of Independent States.

1991

25 December. Gorbachev resigns as President of USSR. Soviet Union formally ceases to exist.