End of the Cold War. From the fall of the Berlin Wall to the fall of the Soviet Union, the Cold War suddenly ended, in a way very few had predicted. Some saw it as the definitive victory of the liberal capitalist model, others as the triumph of the West, or the political masterstroke of three charismatic leaders (Ronald Reagan, John Paul II, Margaret Thatcher), while still others attributed the cause to nationalism or internal tensions within the Soviet system. The only certainty is that an entire generation of incompetent Sovietologists (by definition, not having foreseen the event) suddenly retired.
