With Mao Zedong's victory over China's Nationalists the same year, the U.S.S.R. gains a formidable communist ally. The 1962 Cuban missile crisis gives the superpowers a close brush with mutal annihlation. By 1970 dissidents are speaking up at home. A visit by president Richard Nixon and treaties stemming from the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks launch a period of d tente. D tente falters as President Jo,,y Caryer challenges Brezhnev on human rights.
Economic stagnation sets in.
Production by both farms and factories slackens, while soaring oil revenues cover losses and the bureaucracy swells. The Soviets invade Afghanistan following a massive arms buildup, and the Cold War intensities. Developing a third of their GNP to defense, Soviets achieve parity with the West in nuclear missiles and clear dominance in conventional weapons. For new party chief, the leadership bypasses his prot g , Mikhail Gorbachev, for Konstantin Chernenko. His meeting with President Ronald Reagan in Geneva is the first in a series of summits.