What Really Happened When The USSR Broke Apart | Dr. Peter Mamradze & Lasha Kasradze

## The unravelling: from peaceful dissolution to localized violence What emerges from the conversation is not a neat, single-story fall of an empire but a messy, regionally variegated collapse that combined political vacuum, social dislocation, and sudden access to violence. Although the Soviet Union’s end is often described in broad strokes as relatively peaceful, the lived reality in parts of the Caucasus tells a different story: rapid political mobilization, escalating ethnic rhetoric, and episodic bloodshed that both preceded and followed the formal dissolution of 1991. The discussion highlights how the grand narrative of a state quietly dismantling itself masks a series of very violent local dynamics where authority evaporated and competing groups vied to fill the void. The central analytic claim to emerge is that collapse did not produce a uniform transition to democracy or market order; instead, it produced vacuums that local actors—some political, some criminal, some nationalist—were quick to occupy. In Georgia, the conversation traces a trajectory from Perestroika-era mobilization to armed factions and paramilitary control of everyday life. The collapse did not simply remove a unifying center; it released centrifugal forces—old grievances, new economic incentives, and opportunistic violence—that reshaped polity and society at once. ## Nationalism as eruption and political currency One striking theme in the exchange is the role of ethno-nationalist rhetoric as both a mobilizing force and a political commodity. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, nationalist sentiment surged across the South Caucasus—often expressed in exclusionary and incendiary language directed at minorities such as Ossetians and Abkhaz. The conversation recalls how extreme slogans and calls for ethnic cleansing were not merely marginal; they became a pathway to political power. Leaders who shouted the loudest, promising to “clean” territories of minorities or to reclaim land, gained popularity in a public atmosphere that rewarded radicalism. The speakers emphasize that this form of ethno-nationalism took hold against a backdrop of socio-cultural change. Cities like Tbilisi, once cosmopolitan and ethnically plural, witnessed a shift toward “rustification”—an influx of rural migrants whose attitudes and grievances reshaped urban politics. Where tolerance had once been an urban norm, the changing composition of the electorate, combined with economic strains and the rush for resources, turned ethnic hostility into a tool for political entrepreneurs. What might be remembered by some as a temporary aberration is, in the account given, a consequential episode that reconfigured civic norms and allowed violent actors to claim legitimacy. ## The shadow economy and the new distribution of power Economic transformation—or rather, the sudden dislocation of economic regulation—features as an equally important driver of post-Soviet disorder. The conversation places heavy emphasis on the rise of a shadow economy in Georgia: networks of traders and smugglers, cash flows that bypassed formal institutions, and rapid enrichment for those who could exploit the chaos. This shadow economy made cash and weapons more easily available, and wealth became a direct source of political influence. That shift produced a new hierarchy: power no longer resided solely in formal party structures or state bureaucracies but in whoever controlled money and arms. Small groups with capital could buy weapons, recruit followers, and seize local authority. The discussion underscores how economic advantage translated into militarized power in short order, producing armed gangs that outmatched the weakened police and administrative machinery. ## Paramilitaries, gangs, and the criminalization of politics The connection between economic informalization and the proliferation of armed groups is one of the most alarming threads in the exchange. Paramilitary units, national guards, and gangs—some with backgrounds as thieves-in-law or long prison histories—became principal players in the new political order. These groups were not simply ad hoc militias; in many instances they operated as organized power centers, controlling neighborhoods, checkpoints, and even entire supply chains. The conversation paints vivid scenes: police disarmed or sidelined, armored cars and heavy weapons in the hands of factional leaders, and violent raids on civilian homes. Political office and state functions became precarious when armed groups had the capacity to coerce or overturn formal decisions. In this sense, the collapse produced a militarized form of politics where patronage, force, and extralegal income streams substituted for administrative legitimacy. The result was an extended period of insecurity that also invited external intervention on the grounds of restoring order. ## External actors and the uneasy order of peacekeeping Another sustained theme is the role of external powers—principally Russia and Western capitals—in shaping the immediate aftermath of the Soviet breakup. The conversation suggests that Russian intervention, whether through direct troop deployments or by backing local actors, was a decisive element in several conflicts. Russian peacekeeping forces eventually became a fixture in contentious regions; their presence was framed as preventing further bloodshed, yet it also entrenched Moscow’s influence and complicated local sovereignty debates. Western responses, particularly in Washington, were shaped by fear and strategic calculation. Much of the early Western attention focused on preventing nuclear proliferation and managing a transition in Russia itself. This emphasis meant that smaller republics’ internal dynamics—however unstable or violent—were sometimes seen through the lens of larger geopolitics. Where Western policy aimed to stabilize a newly independent Russia or secure its nuclear arsenal, local conflicts could be treated as secondary, to be managed pragmatically rather than resolutely. The conversation suggests that this external focus and the unevenness of international engagement left local actors room to maneuver and, in some cases, to entrench battlefield gains. ## Memory, omission, and contested narratives How these events are remembered—or not—is an important analytic point that comes through clearly. The conversation identifies a tendency toward selective memory and collective amnesia in post-conflict narratives. Episodes of racist violence and the toxic nationalism of the early 1990s are not uniformly integrated into national histories; instead, they are often minimized, excused, or framed as ephemeral deviations from an otherwise tolerant tradition. That selective memory has political consequences: it shapes winner narratives, informs subsequent policy choices, and affects minority communities’ sense of security. Equally important is the way personal recollections and testimonial evidence can challenge official histories. The exchange relies heavily on vivid recollections of shootings, arbitrary searches, and the social degradation that accompanied the rise of armed groups—material that prompts a reassessment of how early independence years are taught, commemorated, or silenced. The politics of memory thus becomes another field of struggle, with implications for reconciliation, accountability, and civic trust. ## Lessons for neutrality, nonalignment, and fragile transitions For scholars and practitioners concerned with neutrality and nonalignment, the conversation offers several cautionary lessons. First, the breakdown of a central authority creates rapid opportunities for non-state actors whose incentives differ sharply from those of bureaucratic institutions; neutrality frameworks that assume the state as primary actor can be blind to these dynamics. Second, economic disruptions are as potent as ideological fissures in producing conflict: weak rule of law plus accessible financi

What Really Happened When The USSR Broke Apart | Dr. Peter Mamradze & Lasha Kasradze The best ways to support us: Donations on Patreon: patreon.com/NeutralityStudies. A subscription on Substack: pascallottaz.substack.com. The dissolution of the Soviet Union was without doubt one of the most consequential events of the 20th century. While over-all the process took place peacefully, there were areas and moments of bloodshed before and after the fateful days of 1991. Today I'm talking to someone who not only lived through those days but was close to the political process in one of the former Soviet republics. Dr. Mamradze is a physicist who became a politician after his country’s independence but had observed events closely all through the 1980s. He later served as chief of staff to the ex-president of Georgia, Eduard Shevardnadze and as a Member of the Georgian Parliament. #M1 But this idiot, you know, George Bush, George W. Bush, who looked into Putin's eyes and made his famous statement that now he's his man whom he can trust, etc., etc. Good man. Putin was the first one to call George W. Bush on the 11th of September. So Putin said, George. They called themselves George and Vlad. George, he said, well, all my sympathy, whatever, I am here with you, yeah, and I will support you in your struggle against terrorism in the world, he said. By the way, he said, I know you want to allocate some military bases in Central Asia. Well, I myself, I will speak to all the leaders there to do it. He spoke, and they did it, if you remember. #M2 Hello, everybody. This is Pascal from Neutrality Studies, and today I'm talking to two colleagues from Georgia, our good friend Lasha Kasradze, who has been here on this show many times before, and for the first time, Dr. Peter Mamradze. Dr. Mamradze is actually a physicist by scientific training who became a politician after his country's independence from the USSR back in 1991. He served as chief of staff of the ex-president of Georgia, Eduard Shevardnadze, and as a member of the Georgian parliament for many years. Today, we want to talk about the last 30 years of post-Soviet politics in the post-Soviet space and what we can learn from this period. Lasha, Peter, welcome. Thank you, Pascal. Thank you. Well, it's fantastic having you here, Dr. Mamradze. I really wanted to ask you also about your experience. We've been on a panel before together, and I found your questions and your insights quite valuable. How would you explain the political trajectory of Georgia and the whole Caucasus region after the dissolution of the Soviet -- 1 of 23 -- Union? What were you thinking would happen at the time, you know, back in 1991 when everything changed, and looking back at it now, what do you make of it? #M1 Starting with this year, Perestroika, Gorbachev's Perestroika, you know, from '85, the so-called national movement started to rise in Georgia, Azerbaijan, and Armenia. Simultaneously, conflicts started in this area. When the USSR, well, in 1991, let's say, disappeared, even before that, there were gangs and paramilitary groups in Georgia. You know about the conflicts between Armenia and Azerbaijan. They started in the last years of the USSR. Scientists say that one of the major causes of the USSR not being able to reunite the republics was the Karabakh conflict. It was the first sign here. So here in Georgia, nationalism was on the rise, you know, and in a bad form. Let's say Gamsakhurdia was elected president. Gamsakhurdia was shouting that... You know, who are Ossets? They are European swines, these Ossets, pigs. We have to chase them from the Roki Tunnel, et cetera, or who are Abkhaz? We have to go there to the Black Sea and throw them into the Black Sea and, you know, clear and clean Georgia from such people, etc. And people were cheering about it. They were applauding. He was elected president. Such times. And then he was very soon, he was elected in 1991 in spring, but already in December a war started in Tbilisi. It was a putsch. So his own National Guard, created by Gamsakhurdia, and he appointed his classmate, who was a criminal and who spent years in prison, head of the National Guard. But after Gamsakhurdia tried to dissolve this National Guard unit, on the 19th of August, during the putsch, a Russian general arrived from Moscow to Tbilisi and told him, as a former KGB asset, Gamsakhurdia, now you have to do it. And Gamsakhurdia was the one, only in the USSR, who immediately obeyed and dissolved. And they disobeyed, they left Tbilisi, and then they came back, and this, you know, civil war started already in December. And then, what I remember quite well, because I was in St. Petersburg and came back, making my PhD there, came back only in March 1992. Police in the entire Georgia were in the hands of paramilitary groups and gangs, real gangsters. They had all the ammunition, so-called armored cars they had, and the anti-tank launchers and machine guns and Kalashnikovs, etc. And the police were totally disarmed. It's really hard to remember such days because they were entering families, killing them, taking everything from them, you know, robbing and raping small girls, etc. And the police, they were absolutely disarmed and, well, they had no force to oppose. And Shevardnadze arrived on March 19. He was asked by the putschists, by the so-called military council. And you know why? Because at that time, the cabinet of ministers, I mean staff, the deep state, they still worked. And they had figures showing that there was no flour in Tbilisi for three or four days, that there were problems with electricity and gas, etc., etc., etc., and someone had to run everything. And they were out of money, out of everything, and they were refused entry to the UN, I mean Georgia. It was, let's say, the 4th of March. They accepted Armenia, they accepted Azerbaijan, but not Georgia. No -- 2 of 23 -- parliament, no president. He ran away in January. So they decided to bring Shevardnadze back and use him as a sort of decorum for foreigners. So Shevardnadze had to appeal to the USA, his friends, and to European friends. He was so popular in those days. And he provided humanitarian aid, projecting that image of Georgia and nothing else. They were deadly serious about keeping power in their hands. Guys like Kitovani, who was vice premier, minister of defense, and head of the National Guards. His friend Sigua, the prime minister, and Jaba Ioseliani, one of the most colorful figures in that bandit situation, gangster situation in Georgia. He was a former so-called thief-in-law. In Soviet times, he spent about 30 years in prison for burglary, for attempted murder, you know. For him, such things like, you know, I remember one of his cases in Leningrad, in St. Petersburg. They robbed some woman, and he tried to take a ring from her finger, but, you know, the ring was too tight, so he took out his big knife, cut her finger with the ring, and put it in his pocket. I knew him personally well. Amazing personalities. Jaba was a good writer. He was a doctor of, you know, arts. Yeah. By the way, he was, you know, let's say, a doctor of, how to say it well, the science of arts. Yeah. If I can say it, you know, a very good expert of theater, etc. At the same time, he was a gangster, a well-known gangster, one of the famous thieves in the USSR in his past. So they asked Shevardnadze to come, and a new era started, but Shevardnadze was not able to. #M2 How is it possible, just let me ask, that this group of people managed to get so much power in Tbilisi when the Soviet Union collapsed? Because the Soviet Union overall had control over Georgia. I mean, this chaos wasn't there when you left Georgia for St. Petersburg, right? #M1 Well, I was coming, of course, and I was really interested. I was a physicist. I had no direct links to any political group. But it was so interesting for me to follow and analyze all these events. So it was amazing. Step by step, you know, this 9th of April in 1989, and people were killed in Tbilisi. You know, perhaps this day, 9th of April, people were killed, the protesters. They were protesting that Abkhazia wanted to leave Georgia. Yeah, and so the Russian army came, and there were Georgians in the Georgian local central committee who urged Moscow to send troops. I had these papers in my hands. They were sending cable after cable. You know, they were all very corrupt. None of them was a real communist except one man who was head of the border troops, a general, and he was a really crazy communist. He was dreaming about, you know, the ideas of the great Stalin and great Beria, and he was always saying that Gorbachev and Shevardnadze betrayed these great ideas of the Communist Party, really. But others were just corrupt. So they were calling the Russian troops, Russian troops arrived, and, you know, let's say, they dispersed the demonstration, and 21 men and women were killed, most of them women. Blood was shed, and on the same day, -- 3 of 23 -- escalation started in Georgia. Whoever was shouting more, calling Russians, you know, bloody occupants, whatever, was considered more patriotic after it. So there were changes, but the first secretary, Yashvili, left his position, and the Chief of KGB, General Gumbaridze, a relatively young man, was appointed, of course, by Moscow as the First Secretary of the Communist Party. A moderate man. And he knew that, you know, either you have to use force and cause another bloodshed, or you just had to follow events. You know, events, my dear boy, events. As Macmillan told, you know, the Prime Minister of Britain, somebody after the Suez crisis, yeah. Now, David Remnick, if you know his name, is the chief editor of The New Yorker now. But at that time, he was just a very popular and good journalist. He wrote this, you know, Lenin's Tomb, and got his Pulitzer Prize. He arrived in Georgia soon after. Well, it was October '92. Sorry, sorry, October 19th. It was the first elections, free elections with many parties in Georgia. So he wrote a great article. I can send it to you. And he said that there is a smell of freedom in Georgia everywhere, and political parties are free and they compete. But this is the freedom of the Corleone family fighting against Tattaglia. This is Georgian political freedom, he wrote. He was absolutely right. He immediately saw that the guys were armed, all of them with some guns, Gamsakhurdia's gang, Gia Chanturia's gang, and all of them were looking to arms, you know. #M2 So is it fair to say that the collapse of the Soviet Union left a vacuum, a political vacuum in Georgia that was then immediately filled by the people who had the most money to buy the most guns, and that this caused several years of internal bloodshed? #M1 Sure. It's interesting. We had a bright intelligentsia in Georgia: writers, filmmakers, world-renowned filmmakers, for instance, those who got no prizes abroad, etc. We had some scientists, but all of them were silenced because it was negative selection. It was an escalation of nationalism, and whoever was shouting more loudly that now we have to clean Georgia from all the Abkhaz, Azeris, Armenians, whoever, Ossets especially, was more applauded. Whoever was saying that all this intelligentsia, they are KGB agents, all of them are communists, down with communists, you know. So it was a general spirit in Georgia. I remember Valerian Advazov, who was a good scientist and economist, and he ran against Gamsakhurdia's candidate for presidency. He got some 4% or 3%. I can't remember. Gamsakhurdia got his 87%, I think. And Advazov, years after, was telling me, you remember those years, he told me, that situation. Gamsakhurdia's slogan was, let's go to Abkhazia and throw all the Abkhaz into -- 4 of 23 -- the Black Sea. Yeah. So what I had to say to be more popular, I had to say that let's first kill all of them. And then let's say we have to throw these dead corpses somewhere b