This book is about two men – Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin – who presided from 1985–1999 over the tumultuous transition from Soviet to post- Soviet politics. The speed of change during the first half of that period was remarkable. In 1985, the Soviet Union appeared to be an entrenched entity, capable of defending itself against all challenges to the Communist Party's right to rule at home and in Eastern Europe, and determinedly pursuing a policy of great-power competition abroad. By the end of 1987, glasnost’ had broken out, the public media were increasingly challenging old doctrines, and the Soviet leadership was starting to make one-sided concessions to the United States on fundamental issues of national security. By the end of 1989, relatively free elections had taken place, Party officials were being voted out of office, communism had collapsed in Eastern Europe, the Soviet Army had retreated in defeat from Afghanistan, and the Cold War was coming to an end. By the end of 1991, an oppositional figure had been elected president of Russia, both communism and the Soviet Union had collapsed, and independent Russia had emerged as a seemingly helpless supplicant of the West. By the end of 1993, independent Russia had experienced two wrenching years of political and economic turmoil at home and was coming to realize the limits of Western willingness to assist its transition from communism. If one had gone to sleep in Moscow in 1985–1986 and woken up in 1992–1993, the change would have been unfathomable.