Perestroika, the restructuring of the Soviet political and economic system, Opened up the possibility of free-market entrepreneurship. Anyone with a fold-up table and some produce could run a vegetable store.
Again, perestroika resulted in scenes like this, of cabbages being sold at market-rate prices on the street. Meanwhile, there were no communist-priced cabbages in the government subsidized and owned grocery stores. In the background is a nuclear power plant. This was five years after the Chernobyl disaster, and many Muscovites would bring Geiger counters (used to detect ionizing radiation) to shop for vegetables such as these.
All Soviet-era children became members of the Young Pioneers, a communist youth movement. The red tie was required, as was a badge with a picture of Lenin on it, with a Cyrillic inscription underneath that read, "Always ready!" My husband, Paul, was a Young Pioneer as a child. When he emigrated, he made a stopover in Italy, where he was deprogrammed from the Soviet propaganda he’d been taught. These Young Pioneers are standing in front of Gum on Red Square.
Before the tanks rumbled down Gorky Street and the coup began, Muscovites gathered in the streets to try to gather information. On TV, which was controlled by the Soviet government, Swan Lake was playing on every channel, so they had to rely on transistor radios like these to hear outside news of what was happening right in their city.
A rainy night, the third night of the coup, just prior to my witnessing three
casualties. These tanks, sympathetic to the communist hard-liners, tried to push their way through the barricade made of trolley buses, which was less
than a mile from the White House. Protesters, standing on each side of the tunnel wall, began throwing Molotov cocktails into the tanks. Chaos ensued.
Moscow, August 21st, 1991.
Protesters blow up the tanks with Molotov cocktails, keeping them from getting through the barricade of trolley buses. These protesters are celebrating having set the tank on fire. Moscow, August 21st, 1991.
Same scene as the prior photo, about fifteen minutes later. Protesters attack the tanks by sheer force of their numbers, climbing on top of them and trying to pull the tank commanders out of their holes. Moscow, August 21st, 1991.