Breakup of the USSR

Dissolution of the Soviet Union

Tanks at Red Square during the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt
Date	December 26, 1991; 26 years ago (1991-12-26)
Location	USSR
Participants	People of the USSR Government of the Soviet Union Governments of Republics of the Soviet Union Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republics of the Soviet Union
Outcome	Dissolution of the Soviet Union into 15 independent republics Conclusion of the Cold War

The dissolution of the Soviet Union occurred on December 26, 1991, officially granting self-governing independence to the Republics of the Soviet Union. It was a result of the declaration number 142-Н of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. The declaration acknowledged the independence of the former Soviet republics and created the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), although five of the signatories ratified it much later or did not do so at all. On the previous day, 25 December 1991, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, the eighth and final leader of the Soviet Union, resigned, declared his office extinct, and handed over its powers – including control of the Soviet nuclear missile launching codes – to Russian President Boris Yeltsin. That evening at 7:32, the Soviet flag was lowered from the Kremlin for the last time and replaced with the pre-revolutionary Russian flag.

Previously, from August to December, all the individual republics, including Russia itself, had either seceded from the union or at the very least denounced the Treaty on the Creation of the Soviet Union. The week before the union's formal dissolution, 11 republics signed the formally establishing the CIS and declaring that the Soviet Union had ceased to exist. Both the Revolutions of 1989 and the dissolution of the USSR also signalled the end of the Cold War.