Title states all. It can be multiple reasons or just a few. I've twiddled to down mainly to 3 reasons, "roughly" that is.

The Stalin personality cult that would subjugate various Soviet leaders to being wild conspiracy theorists and untrustworthy of themselves, their inner groups, intelligence, other leaders of the USSR, etc.

The inability for the Soviet Union to give more independence or political freedom to it's satellite states, and freaking the fuck out when states weren't following the strict set of guidelines from Moscow, (also party leadership changing the internal politics and Moscow relationship of it's satellite states every time a Soviet Leader died/changed their mind on how to operate it's states, Belarus comes to mind.)

Finally, the economy, and the Soviets too fraught with conspiracy to adopt to the global economy when the world started to surpass them on many economic fronts, along with a bloated military budget.

These are my reasons, I akin this degradation like a large column of marble representing USSR and the issues that toiled the USSR like many hammers and chisels, some are bigger than others but ultimately no one hammer or chisel brought an end to the first great socialist experiment. Thoughts?

-7DeadlyFetishes

    • neebay [any,undecided]
      ·
      4 years ago

      domestic as in from within the USSR itself, and roaders as per Mao:

      The number of intellectuals who are hostile to our state is very small. They do not like our state, i.e., the dictatorship of the proletariat, and yearn for the old society. Whenever there is an opportunity, they will stir up trouble and attempt to overthrow the Communist Party and restore the old China. As between the proletarian and the bourgeois roads, as between the socialist and the capitalist roads, these people stubbornly choose to follow the latter. In fact, this road is impossible, and in fact, therefore, they are ready to capitulate to imperialism, feudalism and bureaucrat-capitalism. Such people are to be found in political circles and in industrial and commercial, cultural and educational, scientific, technological, and religious circles, and they are extremely reactionary.

      • Mao's March 12, 1957 Speech at the Chinese Communist Party's National Conference on Propaganda Work

      tl;dr Mao often used the metaphor of there being a road to socialism and an opposing road to capitalism, and denounced those who would choose the latter as "capitalist roaders"

      Deng was one such person Mao specifically called out and labeled as a capitalist roader, a fact I love to bring up to Dengists