The USA put Yeltsin into power with a coup. Then Yeltsin turned over the reins to Putin. To say that the USA "didn't do enough to help Russia transition to democracy in the 1990s" is incredibly ignorant. The USA had no interest in promoting democracy in 90's post-USSR.
Gorbachev was a fool who believed that the USA and the west would not rape his country. We'll never know how many former citizens of the USSR died because of 90's shock therapy.
Gorbachev was a fool who believed that the USA and the west would not rape his country. We'll never know how many former citizens of the USSR died because of 90's shock therapy.