Encyclopedia of Russian History

Yavlinsky’s consuming ambition was to be elected as president. Intelligent, articulate, and principled, he had some important admirers in the West. But he was less successful in forging alliances with other politicians (i.e., regional leaders, or retired general Alexander Lebed) that could have brought him closer to power.

Given the absence of an obvious successor, had Yeltsin resigned on health grounds, Yavlinsky would have had a good shot at the presidency. However, the sickly Yeltsin soldiered on. In the first round of the presidential election on June 16, 1996, Yavlinsky placed a disappointing fourth with 7.3 percent. Yavlinsky reportedly received substantial financial backing from banks such as Most and Menatep; he was certainly able to mount an expensive TV ad campaign. Yavlinsky refused to support Yeltsin in the second round of the election, thereby deeply angering the Yeltsin camp.

Yavlinsky hung on, waiting for Yeltsin’s resignation. After the August 1998 financial crisis brought down Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko, the communists in the Duma refused to approve the return of Viktor Chernomyrdin as prime minister. Yavlinsky resolved the impasse by proposing Yevgeny Primakov as a compromise candidate. But then, in typical Yavlinsky fashion, he refused to join Primakov’s cabinet.

When Yeltsin resigned in December 1999 he was able to hand over the presidency to his chosen successor, Prime Mnister Vladimir Putin, who easily won election in March 2000. Yavlinsky ran once again, but finished a distant third, with 4.8 percent. He then stood by as Putin went on to introduce many of the reforms that Yavlinsky had advocated for years: a flat tax on income and profits, land reform, and tighter control over oil revenues.

Yavlinsky comes across as a man of integrity and ambition who failed to realize his potential. In

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the words of one commentator, he was “the best president Russia never had.” See also: AUGUST 1991 PUTSCH; YABLOKO

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Rutland, Peter. (1999). “The Man Who Would Be King: A Profile of Grigorii Yavlinskii.” Problems of Post-Communism 46: 48-54.

PETER RUTLAND

YAZOV, DMITRY TIMOFEYEVICH

(b. 1923), minister of defense and marshal of the Soviet Union.

A veteran of the Great Patriotic War, Dmitry Yazov joined the army as an enlisted man before he was commissioned in 1942 and served as a combat infantry officer. In the postwar decade Yazov rose through the officer ranks and attended the Frunze Military Academy from 1956 to 1958. He spent the next decade in service with Soviet Group of Forces in Germany, in the Leningrad Military District, and in Cuba during the missile crisis. From 1968 to 1970 he attended the Voroshilov Military Academy of the General Staff. Yazov went on to command the Thirty-fourth Army Corps and Fourth Army. From 1976 to 1979 he headed the Main Directorate for Cadres in the Ministry of Defense. There followed a series of senior positions: deputy commander of the Far Eastern Military District, commander of the Central Group of Force, and commander of the Central Asian Military District. In 1987, in the aftermath of the Rust Affair, Yazov was appointed minister of defense to replace Marshal Sokolov. Yazov oversaw the Ministry during the final days of Soviet intervention in Afghanistan, the negotiation of key arms control agreements, and a period of mounting criticism of the military under glasnost and perestroika. During his tenure Soviet forces were used to intervene in domestic hot spots in the Caucasus, Central Asia, and the Baltic Republics. In 1991 Yazov joined an eight-man junta, the State Committee of the Emergency Situation, composed of senior party, military, and security service personnel, who gambled on a putsch to remove Gorbachev and prevent the dismemberment of the Union. Between August 19 and 21, Yazov was responsible for the movement of forces to ensure an orderly transfer of power.

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RUSSIAN HISTORY

YELTSIN, BORIS NIKOLAYEVICH

He failed and the coup collapsed. Yazov was arrested for his part in the coup and sent to jail, but in February 1994 he received a parliamentary amnesty. In 1998 Yazov was appointed as an advisor to the Directorate of International Cooperation in the Ministry of Defense. See also: AFGHANISTAN, RELATIONS WITH; ARMS CONTROL; AUGUST 1991 PUTSCH

BIBLIOGRAPHY