Gorbachev’s greatest achievement was not Perestroika (restructuring) or glasnost (openness). It was appearing in a Pizza hut commercial in 1997, where a few Russians grudgingly accepted after a lot of argument that thanks to him, the country has a Pizza Hut. And then they immediately order from Domino’s to celebrate their newfound capitalism. Okay, so the last bit doesn’t happen in the commercial, but the USSR did not even take 30 minutes to fall like dominoes after the Berlin Wall.
There were a lot of fallouts from the collapse of the Soviet Empire. Indiana Jones had to look for new villains in both the movies and the video games. In most cases, the Soviets had simply replaced the Nazis and this allowed the sequels to continue with the same villains for many decades. But, from 1989, thanks to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of censorship, the Russian population were also able to play Indiana Jones and would be loathe to kill fellow Russians as villains. Unless one is a former Russian spy in London with an allergic reaction to polonium.
Mikhail lost an election to Boris Yelstin in 1996 cornering a princely 0.5% of the vote. I add princely as it is a sentiment relatable to the young prince of Indian politics. But enough about Sachin Pilot.
Of course, Gorbachev is credited with dismantling the evil Soviet Empire and saving millions of lives in the process. Now if only someone from the erstwhile USSR’s HR team had asked him, “Where do you see Ukraine in 30 years?”
Gorbachev himself has been quoted as saying that more than Perestroika and glasnost, it was in fact the explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear reactor in 1986 that broke the back of the Soviet Empire. Personally, I feel it was the relentless demonising of Russians by Sylvester Stallone in Rambo and Rocky. He caused more damage to the image of Russians than the images of Instagram influencers breaking into Chernobyl to click selfies with hashtags like #YOLO. To which I would say sure, You Only Live Once but radioactive fissile material has a half-life of millions of years. Congratulations! You are now literally as transparent as glasnost from all the radiation.
Did the relentless bashing of Russians by Sylvester Stallone in ‘Rambo’ and ‘Rocky’ break the Soviets’ back? Vikram Poddar thinks so!
It is tough presiding over a declining empire. Many say he got played by US Presidents Reagan and George H.W. Bush who pushed the Russian economy to ruins by escalating the arms race. In contrast, Putin has simply turned off the Nord Stream gas pipeline. He has taken a leaf from his Indian counterparts playing gully cricket, where the guy who owns the bat simply refuses to accept being given out and instead takes the bat home with him. Now the only way for Europeans to play cricket is by freezing in the dark. And the whole world is paying the electricity bill for this day-and-night match between Russia and Ukraine.
As I write this article, Arshdeep Singh is being trolled on the internet for dropping a sitter in the India-Pakistan match. Some might say, Mikhail Gorbachev is the Arshdeep Singh of the USSR — who dropped the ball and the match but at least tried to gracefully take the game into the last over before ending up on the losing side.
It is said that Putin did not even bother to turn up for the funeral of the once great statesman, citing “conflicting work schedule”. People have come up with less lame excuses to take a day off for watching an India-Pakistan match.
At this point, both the fate of the Asia Cup final and the final outcome of the Russia-Ukraine war hang in the balance. In both cases, the spectators look even more tense than the players, losing both fingernails and the shirts on their backs whether betting on the outcome of the match or a mis-match in inflationary expectations.
But one hopes wherever Mikhail is and whatever the outcome of either battle, he is able to look down on the world proudly and say, “The boys played well”.
The author, Vikram Poddar, is a Marwari investment banker turned corporate comedian. The views expressed in this article are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the website.
