Home > Opinion > Meanwhile

The August Coup

Published: 19 Aug. 2025, 00:07

Roh Jung-tae

The author is a writer and a senior fellow at the Institute for Social and Economic Research

The Soviet Union was tottering. Mikhail Gorbachev sought to overcome the crisis by pursuing perestroika (restructuring) and glasnost (openness), steering the system toward transformation. But hard-line Communist conservatives, resisting reform, played their most extreme card. On Aug. 18, 1991, while Gorbachev was resting at his dacha after an overseas trip, they placed him under house arrest.

The following day, Aug. 19, they went on television to announce that Gorbachev was incapacitated for health reasons and that Vice President Gennady Yanayev would serve as acting president. It was the event now remembered as the “August Coup.”

Coup troops’ tanks stand deployed in Moscow’s Red Square, the capital of the former Soviet Union, in Aug. 1991. [AFP]

Moscow’s streets filled with furious citizens. Soldiers dispatched to the scene began slipping out of the coup leaders’ control. Divisions soon broke out among the plotters, while Boris Yeltsin, president of the Russian Republic, emerged as the center of resistance. His defiant speech from atop a tank became an iconic image of an era’s end.

The coup collapsed in just three days, its leaders arrested. Yet Gorbachev’s authority never recovered, and the Soviet Union could no longer endure. On Dec. 26, 1991, it vanished into history. Russia, Ukraine and Belarus went on to form the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).

Boris Yeltsin, president of the Russian Republic, waves the old Russian tricolor to a cheering crowd on Aug. 22, 1991, as a bulletproof shield is held beside him for protection against possible sniper fire. [JOONGANG ILBO]

Yeltsin and the citizens of Moscow had defeated a reactionary coup, but history did not unfold as hoped. Vladimir Putin, Yeltsin’s eventual successor, hollowed out Russia’s democracy. The former capital of communism became the seat of a resurgent nationalist empire. In March 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine. That war has now dragged on for more than three years.

Most recently, U.S. President Donald Trump and President Putin met in Alaska. Reports suggest that Putin proposed a peace agreement if Ukraine would cede territory. A war of aggression in violation of international law may yet be ratified by the logic of force. That is the grim reality before us.

This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.