The satellite states had gone their separate ways two years earlier, but now the Baltic states regained their independence and Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan and all the other constituent republics started out on a new existence as sovereign states. The red flag with the hammer and sickle was run down the Kremlin flagstaff, and a blue, red and white tricolour was run up instead. Russia had again been shorn of empire. The reasons why the Soviet Empire collapsed have been disputed ever since. Many believed that dissident activity and popular protest had brought the regime down. Others argued that President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative — otherwise known as ‘Star Wars’ — had established an unchallengeable American superiority in the arms race, and that this had forced the Kremlin to admit defeat and wind its empire down. Some who resented the passing of the old regime explained its fall in terms of conspiracy theories; economists attributed it to industrial obsolescence, political scientists to advances in computer technology which made it impossible for the regime to control the dissemination of information.
