Word: yazov
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...resources, even the state security apparatus -- to the republics as to make restoring ironfisted Kremlin control of the whole country impossible. Moreover, a new national Cabinet would have been named by representatives of the republics. Some of the eventual coup leaders, including KGB chairman Vladimir Kryuchkov, Defense Minister Dmitri Yazov and Interior Minister Boris Pugo, would almost certainly have lost their jobs. The plotters could not afford to let that treaty go into effect...
...yielded his powers temporarily to Yanayev. An hour later, TASS announced the formation of the eight-member State Committee for the State of Emergency, ostensibly headed by Yanayev. Actually, this gray and ineffectual apparatchik was only a figurehead; the real power probably was held by Kryuchkov, Pugo and Yazov, plus possibly lesser-known figures. Some of Russian republic president Boris Yeltsin's aides later fingered Baklanov as the chief plotter. The committee announced that it would rule by decree for six months, and began setting up some of the machinery of dictatorship. All newspapers except for nine pro-coup sheets...
...employed laborious computations to estimate the Soviet defense outlay. They have usually calculated it at 15% to 20% of the country's gross national product. Experts in Washington now put the real expenditure at about 30% of GNP. When Richard Nixon visited Moscow recently, Defense Minister Dmitri Yazov used figures indicating that the cost is closer to 40% of GNP and that the Soviet GNP is smaller than Western estimates. Says Becker: "No society can endure that level of defense spending...
That kind of bluster is wearing off, and other generals are drawing pointed lessons. Defense Minister Dmitri Yazov told the Supreme Soviet in Moscow that Iraqi air defenses "failed in most cases." Furthermore, "we have weak spots in the antiaircraft system, and we need to examine them." The success of the American F-117A Stealth fighter, of course, throws into question the effectiveness of the whole $100 billion Soviet radar- and missile-defense network...
...awakened by the ringing of the telephone. Gorbachev said Bessmertnykh, Defense Minister Dmitri Yazov and KGB chief Vladimir Kryuchkov were on their way to the Kremlin and asked me to come too. Then he explained: Several minutes ago, the U.S. Secretary of State had called the Foreign Minister at home and informed him that military action would start in a matter of minutes. Gorbachev asked that Bush be informed urgently of his request that the attack be postponed for a time, so that one more attempt could be made to talk Iraq into announcing its readiness to remove its troops...