who was the leader of the soviet union when the berlin wall was built
Khrushchev Nikita Khrushchev Joseph Stalin
title: Soviet Union text: in less than two years. In an attempt to avoid a third short-lived leader, in 1985, the Soviets turned to the next generation and selected Mikhail Gorbachev. Gorbachev made significant changes in the economy and party leadership, called "perestroika". His policy of "glasnost" freed public access to information after decades of heavy government censorship. Gorbachev also moved to end the Cold War. In 1988, the Soviet Union abandoned its nine-year war in Afghanistan and began to withdraw its forces. In the late 1980s, , which paved the way for Revolutions of 1989. With the tearing down of the Berlin Wall title: Leon C. Collins text: Cold War", hosted by former President George H.W. Bush, and moderated by Jim Lehrer of PBS. Five world leaders: George H.W. Bush (former President of the United States 1989-1993), Mikhail Gorbachev (former President of the Soviet Union 1985-1991), Margaret Thatcher (former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom 1979-1990), Brian Mulroney (former Prime Minister of Canada 1984-1993) and François Mitterrand (former President of the French Republic 1981-1995) gathered at a private daylong summit in Colorado Springs,Colorado as part of a weekend fundraiser for the George H.W. Bush Presidential Library Center. They were the world leaders when the Berlin Wall came down, title: Ronald Reagan text: with Gorbachev. The talks culminated in the INF Treaty, which shrank both countries' nuclear arsenals. Reagan began his presidency during the decline of the Soviet Union, and the Berlin Wall fell just ten months after the end of his term. Germany reunified the following year, and on December 26, 1991 (nearly three years after he left office), the Soviet Union collapsed. When Reagan left office in 1989, he held an approval rating of 68 percent, matching those of Franklin D. Roosevelt, and later Bill Clinton, as the highest ratings for departing presidents in the modern era. He was the first title: Berlin Wall text: a notable moment of the Cold War and a high point of the New Frontier. It was a great morale boost for West Berliners, who lived in an exclave deep inside East Germany and feared a possible East German occupation. In a speech at the Brandenburg Gate commemorating the 750th anniversary of Berlin on 12 June 1987, U.S. President Ronald Reagan challenged Mikhail Gorbachev, then the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, to tear down the Wall as a symbol of increasing freedom in the Eastern Bloc: In June 1989 the Hungarian government began dismantling the title: Berlin Wall text: all Russians do not know who built the Berlin Wall. Ten percent of people surveyed thought Berlin residents built it themselves. Six percent said Western powers built it and four percent thought it was a "bilateral initiative" of the Soviet Union and the West. Fifty-eight percent said they did not know who built it, with just 24 percent correctly naming the Soviet Union and its then-communist ally East Germany. Not all segments of the Wall were ground up as the Wall was being torn down. Many segments have been given to various institutions in the world. They can be found,