Could the West have done more to help Russia?

At New Year 1992, the USSR ceased to exist and Russia and the other Soviet republics became independent states. Western powers pondered how to deal with the new world order. Their immediate concern was to seek reassurance about the safe control of nuclear weaponry. The Russian authorities managed to sedate these worries, and by the mid-1990s it had been agreed that the thermonuclear weapons in Ukraine and Kazakhstan would also come into Russia’s hands. Arms control talks with Nato proceeded productively. President Boris Yeltsin himself disliked talking about ‘the West’ as a separate entity and worked for Russia’s own acceptance into the global comity of democratic nations.

At the same time Yeltsin pleaded with the United States and the International Monetary Fund for assistance in smoothing the transition from a communist planned economy to capitalism.