1993 Russian constitutional crisis
The 1993 Russian constitutional crisis, also known as the 1993 October Coup, Black October, the Shooting of the White House or Ukase 1400, was a political stand-off and a constitutional crisis between the Russian president Boris Yeltsin and the Russian parliament that was resolved by Yeltsin using military force.
The relations between the president and the parliament had been deteriorating for some time. The power struggle reached its crisis on 21 September 1993, when President Yeltsin intended to dissolve the country's highest body (Congress of People's Deputies) and parliament (Supreme Soviet), although the constitution did not give the president the power to do so. Yeltsin justified his orders by the results of the referendum of April 1993. Although many in Russia both then and now claim that referendum was not won fairly.[1]
In response, the parliament declared the president's decision null and void, impeached Yeltsin and proclaimed vice president Aleksandr Rutskoy to be acting president. On 3 October, demonstrators removed militia cordons around the parliament and, urged by their leaders, took over the Mayor's offices and tried to storm the Ostankino television centre. The army, which had initially declared its neutrality, stormed the Supreme Soviet building in the early morning hours of 4 October by Yeltsin's order, and arrested the leaders of the resistance. At the climax of the crisis, Russia was thought by some to be "on the brink" of civil war.[2][3] The ten-day conflict became the deadliest single event of street fighting in Moscow's history since the October Revolution.[4]
The Soviet Union broke up on 26 December 1991. Yeltsin's economic reform program took effect on 2 January 1992.[5] Soon afterward prices skyrocketed, government spending was slashed, and heavy new taxes went into effect. A deep credit crunch shut down many industries and brought about a protracted depression. As a result, unemployment reached record levels. The program began to lose support; and the ensuing political confrontation between Yeltsin on the one side, and the opposition to radical economic reform on the other, became increasingly centered in the two branches of government.
Throughout 1992, opposition to Yeltsin's reform policies grew stronger and more intractable among bureaucrats concerned about the condition of Russian industry and among regional leaders who wanted more independence from Moscow. Russia's vice president, Aleksandr Rutskoy, denounced the Yeltsin program as "economic genocide".[7] Indeed, during the first half of 1992, the average income of the population declined 2–2.5 times.[8][clarification needed] Leaders of oil-rich republics such as Tatarstan and Bashkiria called for full independence from Russia.
Also throughout 1992, Yeltsin wrestled with the Supreme Soviet (the standing legislature) and the Russian Congress of People's Deputies (the country's highest legislative body, from which the Supreme Soviet members were drawn) for control over government and government policy. In 1992 the speaker of the Russian Supreme Soviet, Ruslan Khasbulatov, came out in opposition to the reforms, despite claiming to support Yeltsin's overall goals.
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