Question

Looking at how Mikhail Gorbachev's policies changed the Soviet Union, would you consider him a patriot, or in a sense, a subversive?

Answer 1

In Soviet terms, he was a subversive. Most outside the Soviet system see him as a reformer, or a revolutionary.

What he did was to remove Communist Party control, which was corrupt to the core, at a lessor status and power than the Government.

Of the choices, Patriot seems to fit more, however, those who lost power would primary focus on the alternative.

Without Gorbachev's involvement, I am personally not convinced they would have occured anyway, the Soviet control of the economy with all that huge military spending was on a railroad to nowhere. Either collapse or war was about the only result foreseeable. Nor do I see that Ronald Reagen had much to do with it either, as many proclaim.

http://www.brookings.edu/articles/2004/0801russia_talbott.aspx

Gorbachev was instrumental in greatly reducing the Military threat to world peace, and for that he rightly deserved the Peace Prize. However, I suspect there are those who are not so happy about that either.