25 April, 1945, American and Soviet military met at Elbe River, at a place called Torgau. That date is later remembered as "Elbe Day". Araz Yusubov's blog provides an impressive amount of detailed information on the link-up. Details also in this article: Elbe Day: A handshake that made history''. See how is was remembered at Arlington National Cemetery, on April 23, 2010.

President Kennedy was shaken and transformed by the experience of the Cuban Missile Crisis, having stared into the abyss. Chairman Khrushchev was equally terrified - here is the letter he sent to Kennedy on October 30, 1962. --- In a speech held 10 June 1963, titled "A Strategy of Peace", Kennedy announced his new policy (transcription).

"We were perhaps less conscious of Soviet concerns stemming from experience of WW II than we should have been. We were perhaps insufficiently conscious that security requirements of continental power differed from one, like ourselves, surrounded by oceans." -- Source

REVIEW: ‘Reagan at Reykjavik Forty-Eight Hours that Ended the Cold War’ By Ken Adelman, The Washington Post, May 9, 2014

Did Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan come within a hair's breadth of abolishing nuclear weapons, in Reykjavik, Iceland, on Sunday, Oct. 12, 1986? --- Reagan at Reykjavik -- "Ken Adelman shares his riveting firsthand account of the unexpectedly historic summit in Reykjavik, Iceland in 1986 with Reagan and Gorbachev. Originally intended as a planning meeting, negotiations led to the most sweeping nuclear arms accord in history and the end of the Cold War." -- Streamed live on Dec 9, 2014

Study the influence of Edward Teller on Reagan's belief that "Star Wars" concept would really work - the X-ray laser story:
- Re. space based defense against ballistic missiles, in the 1980s, under President Reagan: THE MAN WHO BLEW THE WHISTLE ON 'STAR WARS' : Roy Woodruff's Ordeal Began When He Tried to Turn the Vision of an X-ray Laser into Reality, LA Times, July 17, 1988 --- Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
- Edward Teller: Like a spoiled brat -- Freeman Dyson reminisces

After signing the INF Treaty with President Reagan on 8 Dec 1987, Gorbachev renounced the "Brezhnev doctrine" during a meeting in Yugoslavia 14-18 Mar, 1988 --- with immense implications. In his speech to the United Nations, 8 Dec 1988, Gorbachev unilaterally declared the removal of 10,000 tanks, 8,500 artillery systems and 800 combat aircraft in the Western part of USSR and in the territories of its European allies. --- The unravelling of the Eastern European alliance, the unification of Germany, and finally, the dissolution of USSR itself then happened at an astonishing speed. In mid 1991, the warning signs of an impending collapse of USSR became evident, prompting Dr Graham Allison and Robert D. Blackwill to advocate an aid package to USSR similar to the 1947 Marshall Plan, in America's Stake in the Soviet Future - just before the coup attempt, and six months before Soviet Union ceased to exist.

Evidence seems to support the interpretation that the new fledgling Russian Federation was given special treatment since its inception, due to certain geo-strategic concepts that were prevalent at the time, as described in interview dated 30 Aug 2022 with first-hand witness, Columbia University economist Professor Jeffrey Sachs, who acted as advisor to many countries that struggled with transition from command-based economy to a more market based system (he has since been trying to clear his reputation of being architect of heartless 'shock therapy' economic practice, a concept first introduced by Naomi Klein in her book "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism" ). He published 22 Aug 2022 the article "The West’s False Narrative about Russia and China" and here you might agree or disagree.

"I want to ask you for forgiveness for the dreams that have not come true, and for the things that seemed easy but turned out to be so excruciatingly difficult. I am asking your forgiveness for failing to justify the hopes of those who believed me when I said that we would leap from the grey, stagnating totalitarian past into a bright, prosperous and civilized future. I believed in that dream, I believed that we would cover the distance in one leap."

Boris Yeltsin announces his unexpected resignation on 31 December 1999, to the world's surprise. The complete text of the speech, in Russian and English language.

Prof. Janine R. Wedel provided an account of what happened in Russia during the 1990s^[3] , as did Anne Williamson in her testimony before the Committee on Banking and Financial Services of the United States House of Representatives, on Sep 21, 1999. -- Déjà Vu: How Today’s Western Democracies Recall Eastern Europe under Communism --- A warning from Prof. Janine R. Wedel, published April 25, 2018, among others.

Bill and Boris: A Window Into a Most Important Post-Cold War Relationship, by James Goldgeier, published in Texas University Security Review -- "The Strategist", Vol 1, Iss 4 August 2018 --- also local copy (PDF)

The political scientist Екатерина Шульман refers to the Yeltsin speech in her interview.

In 2023, an ordinary Russian summarizes Gorbachev/Yeltsin era: Gorbachev sold everything! ... The second one drank it all away! -- Source: Decaying Desolate Soviet Wasteland (could you live here?)