August 18, 1991. USSR President Mikhail Gorbachev finds himself isolated at his state dacha in Foros. Communications are down. A state of emergency is being declared in Moscow. And one of the main organizers of these events is the man Gorbachev himself appointed Chairman of the KGB: Vladimir Kryuchkov.
Why did the head of the most powerful Soviet intelligence agency turn against his own president?
In 1988, Gorbachev entrusted Kryuchkov with the leadership of the KGB. But just three years later, he found himself among the key participants in the State Emergency Committee (GKChP) – an attempt to halt political changes that, according to its organizers, were leading the country to disintegration.
What happened between Gorbachev and Kryuchkov?
In this documentary, we examine:
How Vladimir Kryuchkov rose from Yuri Andropov's ally to Chairman of the KGB.
Why Kryuchkov lost trust in Gorbachev's policies and his relations with the West.
What Soviet intelligence reported about the domestic crisis.
Why the new Union Treaty became a threat to part of the Soviet leadership.
How the events of August 1991 were prepared.
Who gave the order to isolate Gorbachev in Foros.
Why the State Emergency Committee failed to hold on to power despite the support of the KGB, army, and Interior Ministry leaders.
How an attempt to preserve the Soviet Union by extreme means accelerated its collapse.
Gorbachev and Kryuchkov. The President of the USSR and the Chairman of the KGB. Two men who claimed to want to preserve the country but had completely different visions of its future.
This is a story about power, trust, political intrigue, and the decisions that changed the fate of the Soviet Union.
The film uses historical documents, investigative materials from the State Emergency Committee case, the memoirs of participants, and published archival evidence. Controversial versions are separated from established facts. ___
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