Hanna asked: What do people in other ex USSR countries think about Gorbachev?
So, there comes an answer
Lithuania also was a part of Soviet union back then and I (being a Lithuanian myself) think that most of Lithuanians now are really very happy that such a union do not exist now anymore.
I guess Gorbachev actually was the most normal president of Russia compared with other ones that ruled before him...
And actually I'm really happy that Lithuania was the first country who regained independence after these terrible years of occupation and other countries did the same. ( I guess now a lot of Russians who will read this will start to hate me because of what I said but, anyway, it's my oppinion)
Actually, I don't think that Soviet union do not exist anymore because of the things that Gorbachev did.
It's existance wouldn't have lasted much longer even if he hadn't ruled this country. I think that it's really naive to think that you can create a stong union by occupying the country, starting killing and deportating it's people to Siberia... destroying culture and language of this country... trying to make all it's people atheists, nationalizing all their lands and forcing them to work in these terrible farms and of course paying almost nothing for it...and doing many other terrible things and then expect that these countries will want to be a member of such union, even though they never wanted to be a part of it at all!!!
If such a union existed even now, the only one quite good thing would be just that now there wouldn't be any need for me to study Russian language by myself. And you know why? The answer is: because I would have been FORCED to learn that while I was still in primary school! Anyway, noone can change history and it would be quite stupid to start blaming someone now for the things that was done in my country, because nothing would change because of it anyway. But these things can never be delated from peoples' memory.