WORLD REPORT EXTRA: The Coup and Beyond : The Press : Praise Flows for Yeltsin, Soviet Courage

If it is truly the world’s press that writes the first draft of history, then the failure of the rightist coup in Moscow will be compared to the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution in the impact it will have on the future of that immense and troubled nation. And the populist Siberian-born president of the Russian Federation, Boris N. Yeltsin, is clearly the man of the hour.

Here are some editorial excerpts from the global media:

“In October, 1917, the Bolsheviks seized power in 10 days. They appear to have lost it again in three, and with a great deal less bloodshed. Hopelessly underestimating the democratic forces unleashed by glasnost, the leaders of the old order have been swept away by the sheer courage of the Soviet people. This is the authentic mass revolution that the 1917 putsch claimed to be, but never was. It is indisputably one of the great moments of modern times.

“The hero of the drama is, of course, Boris Yeltsin. This Siberian peasant was for years shunned by Western leaders as a boorish demagogue, whose extravagances threatened the supremacy of the preferred Mr. Gorbachev. It is now clear how gravely the West underrated Mr. Yeltsin, even after he had won a landslide victory in elections for the Russian presidency . . .

“It was a measure of the new mood of Moscow that, throughout the bungled coup, television cameras and newspaper correspondents were able to relay every twist to the outside world. The telephone lines to Moscow never went down. The isolation, on which Soviet tyranny always depended, could not be re-established. It would be foolish now to project any euphoric vision of the future. A free, democratic society remains a long day’s march away. But the triumph of the people, and of their hero, Mr. Yeltsin, is one of the most moving in a century in which so many abominable crimes have been committed in the people’s name.”

--The Daily Telegraph, London

“This is the end of 60 hours that shook the world. This is a moment of triumph in the Soviet Union. For freedom and the human spirit. It is the triumph of the untold thousands who took to the streets of Moscow and Leningrad to pit their flesh and blood against guns and tanks.

“But above all it is the triumph of one remarkable, courageous man, Boris Yeltsin . . .

“That is why we hope and believe that the Soviet people will soon have the good sense to entrust their destiny to him.”

--The Sun, London

“Yesterday marked an astonishing triumph for Boris Yeltsin and Russian democracy. The triumph was not just personal. It marked the clear end to a method of ruling the Soviet Union--by cliques, bullying, lying and conspiracy--that has lasted since 1917. The agency of the triumph, resistance on the streets of the cities and division within the armed forces, matters less than the fact itself. After two days of despair there is now glorious hope . . . “That said, Mr. Gorbachev, with such moral authority as remains to him, and Mr. Yeltsin, with such authority as he can rightfully claim, have a heavy duty jointly to greet the dazzling opportunity this extraordinary event offers them and the world. The opportunity is there for the final and complete break with Leninism and all its works; the return of Russia to a free economy; the entrenchment of democratic rights in one of the great nations of the world; the freeing of dozens of subject states from one of the century’s most oppressive imperial yokes; the demolition of one of the world’s most terrifying arsenals; and active participation in the policing of world conflicts.”

--The Times, London

“The West has been two-faced in the past. It has cheered on democracy in the Soviet Union, it has praised Mikhail Gorbachev to the skies; and it has rubbed its hands gleefully as the Soviet Union lost purpose and power, cruelly joking about Mr. Gorbachev’s decline. Most recently, it has refused to consider large-scale economic aid and demanded total obeisance to the free-market cult before handing over even the little that has been agreed.

“The failure of the coup now gives us a second chance . . . We could have paid dearly for our selfishness in the past; let us not make this same mistake again.”

--The Guardian, London

” . . . In an irony without parallel in Soviet history, the people have restored to office the unpopular president who had given them the freedom to openly criticize him.”

--The Toronto Star, Toronto

“However welcome Mr. Gorbachev’s restoration to power is, it is hedged by this significant reservation: That if he hopes to be the agent of democratic reforms, the Soviet leader must himself submit to the people in an election.

“He might be defeated, but there are worse fates than losing at the polls, as the coup leaders showed him earlier this week. Crucial as Mr. Gorbachev was in engineering the reforms of the past several years, it would be a mistake to consider him indispensable to the future of a reformed Soviet Union. He should remain leader as long as the people wish him to remain.”

--The Globe and Mail, Toronto

“Boris Yeltsin deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. Without his courage, his energy and his cleverness, this page in Moscow would not have turned. The flight of the junta is therefore his very personal triumph. The attempt by the KGB to lure him to the Crimea to visit Gorbachev was blatantly the old guard’s final attempt to eliminate Yeltsin. Luckily, he didn’t fall for it. After these dramatic days, Yeltsin is indisputably No. 1 in the Soviet Union. . . . The soldiers did not shoot at their own people, which many had feared. The storming of the Russian Parliament also failed to come about. The officers and their soldiers gave their loyalty to the will of the people, but their focal point, without which this happy ending may not have happened, was Yeltsin. . . . Events have shown the West how strong the desire for freedom and reform is in the U.S.S.R. The West has an additional obligation to give aid, speedily and generously.”

-- Die Welt , Hamburg, Germany

“Wherever the enemies of the people find a place to stay in the coming time, no one will want to be seen near them. Something nasty was always expected from the Moscow putsch leaders; but now they have also proved themselves incompetent to even carry out their dastardly intentions. Now Gorbachev can fulfill his task in Moscow again. The liberal-minded are glad. Indeed, when the jubilation has died down, some will ask themselves how much trust should be placed in Gorbachev in the future.”

--Frankfurter Allgemeine ,

Frankfurt, Germany

“The violent spasm experienced by the Kremlin jangled the nerves of the European Community, which saw the ghost of the Cold War reviving, and the great majority of the countries of the U.N., which felt a real threat to their future. The destiny of the democratization process in the U.S.S.R. can never again be watched with indifference by the rest of the Earth’s countries.”

-- La Nacion, Santiago, Chile

“The Western countries, which were shaken by the recent events, will have to examine more profoundly the way in which their own interests are compromised with the destiny of the (Soviet) Union and, consequently, design a strategy, realistic but effective, of support for Soviet reformism.”

--El Mercurio, Santiago, Chile

“In the late 20th Century, democracy has imposed itself again, perhaps in the most relevant episode of so many that have been played out in Europe, because it involves the failure of the final attempt at survival by a totalitarian method in collapse.”

-- La Epoca, Santiago, Chile

“The strong support of the United States and Western countries for democratic factions in the Soviet Union was the ultimate reason for the failure of the coup d’etat . . . The international community can no longer tolerate a scramble for political power through illegal means. . . . Peace and prosperity in the world will only materialize when we share common values of democracy, market economy and humanitarianism. . . . It is likely to become more acceptable behavior in the international community to put pressure on those who illegally try to usurp power.”

-- Yomiuri Shimbun, Tokyo

“There was the danger of a civil war in the Soviet Union with all that implies of a major military power. Nothing is more delightful than that such a worst-case scenario was avoided. . . . What can be said is that the Soviet people, who were said to meekly follow the powerful, have changed greatly. . . . In order to turn the disaster of the coup d’etat into a blessing, it is to be hoped that a stable political structure will come into being that fits the new age.”

-- Asahi Shimbun , Tokyo

“Above all, the biggest mistake of the coup leaders was their absurd attempt to resist the surging tide of global reform. The Soviet people in fact have outgrown their outdated Marxist-Leninist swaddling clothes that have constricted the nation for the past seven decades and a return to communist dictatorship is the last thing they will compromise on.”

--The Korea Times, Seoul

“The failure of the putsch is the final sign of the ideological, organizational and even the coercive fatigue of communism. The mummy moved but it was proven that there was only a cadaver inside. . . .

“The man who comes back into the Kremlin, saved by the partisans of democracy and notably by the incarnation of the anti-communist resistance, Boris Yeltsin, inherits a kind of second political life with the responsibility of accelerating the reforms in process and ratify the break with the last vestiges of communism.”

--Liberation, Paris

“The biggest service for the world performed by Mikhail Gorbachev was to have given the Soviet people the reflexes of freedom.”

-- Le Figaro, Paris

“The intrinsic problems of the U.S.S.R. will not disappear as rapidly as the putschists and they may be as resistant to solutions as ever. The impact of 70 years of corruptive Communist rule cannot be reversed overnight; nor can the age-old nationalist and ethnic antagonisms be easily ameliorated. This week’s tremor will undoubtedly not be the last. Nor can one count on the next ones to be as benign. That is the lesson one hopes the Jews of the U.S.S.R. have now thoroughly learned.”

-- Jerusalem Post, Jerusalem

“The trauma of the overthrow may pull immigration out of its relative recent mediocre level. This will require heightened efforts for absorption. If we will succeed in making them understand that freedom in Israel, despite the problems, is sweet. Let’s hope that as a result of the coup, we will enjoy the sight of hundreds of thousands of Jews coming to Israel.”

-- Haaretz , Jerusalem

“It is not easy to understand why the coup failed so quickly . . . In terms of brute force its victory was a mathematical certainty. It was politics that failed the coup leaders. The greatest errors of these government officials, incapable of seeing an inch beyond the bureaucratic world in which they function, was in believing they could capitalize on discontent against Gorbachev, particularly over the economic situation. . .

-- El Pais, Madrid