http://www.thenation.com/article/165317/world-really-safer-without-soviet-union
Dear friends: Led by political and economic reformer Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet Union agreed with presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush to end the cold war and to reduce nuclear arms. A revolt by diehard communists weakened Gorbachev and resulted in Boris Yeltsin and the leaders of Ukraine and Belorussia abolishing the Soviet Union. The removal of the Soviet Union as a countervailing power created a void into which rushed the American Neoconservatives with their ideology of American Empire. The US has been at war ever since, and the Neoconservative drive for Empire is bringing the US into confrontation with Russia and China.
During the time that Gorbachev was working to create conditions for world peace and extending democratic rule to Soviet peoples, the American right-wing demonized Gorbachev as the anti-Christ and accused him of plotting to destroy the United States.
Gorbachev and Reagan cooperated to remove the threat of nuclear war. George W. Bush and Obama have resurrected the threat. I recommend Gorbachev’s account of the serious threat that Washington’s arrogance and hubris pose to the world.