“The Collapse of the Soviet Union … a prelude to the collapse, the causes of the collapse, and its importance today”   

A talk by Dick Shriver.  Dick speaks from his experience, first as an assistant secretary of Defense

in the office of the Secretary of Defense at the height of the Cold War. Thereafter, he worked as a private citizen and advisor to the heads of state and other senior government officials of several republics of the Soviet Union. Following the collapse, he opened 16 offices throughout the former Soviet Union to promote economic recovery as part of the US assistance program to the newly independent

states of the former USSR.  In 1995, he and his wife, Barbara, moved to western Ukraine for seven years where they founded and ran a non-profit management consulting firm.  Dick’s talk will trace the origins of the Cold War, the arms race and the concept of  Mutually-Assured-Destruction (MAD). He offers his reasons as to why the USSR collapsed in 1991 without a shot being fired and the chaos that followed the collapse. 

He will discuss the rise of Russia’s Vladimir Putin, why Putin invaded Ukraine, and why and how the Ukrainians have resisted so fiercely and well.  Dick will end with an open discussion of “What next?”