Mikhail Gorbachev's visions of a reformulated Soviet Union encompassing glasnost, perestroika and The New Thinking after the abrupt departure of the ailing Konstantin Chernenko revolutionized Soviet foreign policy and the CPSU as well. Though mentored by the infamous Yuri Andropov, Gorbachev was not a product of the Great Patriotic War but rather a new-age Russian technocrat who realized that the experiment of the CPSU was coming to a close. He could not anticipate that he would unleash a dynamic torrent of unintended consequences that would cause the implosion of the entire Soviet Union and its satellite system transforming the Russian experiment in socialism to a new phase of experimental engagement with western-style democracy. Students of the political dynamics of the Russian empire will observe the evolutionary nature of the transition that the visionary Gorbachev precipitated. Historians and comparative political scientists will understand the gravity and important implications that this dramatic twist in Russian political history has wrought and the continued dramatic changes in store for the Medvedev-Putin siloviki administration in the current nationalized Russian state.

The visionary Gorbachev suffered unintended consequences with glasnost, perestroika and the new thinking resulting in the implosion of the Soviet Union in 1991. Yeltsin served as a transitional custodian in the experimental democratic period struggling with the potential devolution of the Russian State as well as an anemic Russian foreign policy. Vladimir Putin arrived to return the floundering Russian state to its previous status as a world power, if not superpower, with his extensive Siloviki administration and a dynamic new petro-dollar economy. Though an illiberal democracy, falling short of American expectations, Putin's "democracy of law" represents a realist-nationalist approach to a unique Russian history of strongman rule while introducing progressive elements of pluralistic government. September 11, 2001, as well as the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, continued to skew Russian-American relations. However, integration of Russia into western and international institutions portends to stimulate continuing strategic cooperation between Russia and the United States, as well as other major international actors to include the European Union.