Collapse of the Soviet Union

With glasnost and perestroika making the USSR less censor craving and more democratic than what a communist nation should be, the citizens of the Soviet Union realized that they were worse off than ever and decided that the 15 states in the Union would break free. Not long after free elections were legalized in the Soviet Union in 1990, Lithuania announced that it would restore its independence which led to other Soviet states to declare their intention to do so. The presidential elections in the Union which saw Boris Yeltsin winning the Russian election was seen as an outrage by the communists who then declared a coup in August 1991 in an attempt to reverse reforms made by Mikhail Gorbachev (the only leader of the Soviet Union born after the establishment of the union). During the failed coup, Latvia and Estonia declared themselves independent followed by Ukraine. The Communist Party of the Soviet Union was disbanded following the coup by Mikhail Gorbachev who then resigned on 25 December 1991. By the time he resigned, Belarus, Armenia, Tajikistan, Azerbaijan, Moldova, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and the Republic of Georgia had broken free of the Union. At 7:32PM Moscow Time, the Soviet Union flag was lowered for the last time at the Kremlin and was replaced by the Russian Federation flag. The Alma-Ata was signed which officially declared the dissolution of the Soviet Union official which became official on 26 December 1991. The Soviet Union had been around for 68 years, 11 months and 26 days and its collapse affected those who benefited with the Soviet system.