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Description
The Soviet Union is dead, long live the Soviet Union!

That is the catchphrase of the 1990s in what is still known as the USSR, but other than abbreviations and a few titles is very different from the Soviet state that we are familiar with from the Cold War.

In this timeline the August Coup consolidates control over the Soviet state more effectively in the ensuing days and weeks, as they manage to arrest and detain Boris Yeltsin but fail to capture Mikhail Gorbachev, who demands the putschist GKChP to step down with pressure from the international community. The hardliners however do not relent, and violently suppress a relatively small but energetic uprising by furious Muscovites, which sparks many abortive insurrections all over the Soviet Union. After three bloody months the Soviet Union is on the brink of a terrible civil war, with the world nervous over its potential for nuclear violence and a possible catastrophic spillover.

Unyielding to both fear and diplomatic pressure, the GKChP refuses to interact in any way with the internationally recognized Soviet government which at this stage had fled to Lvov, but in November 1991 a second coup occurs from within the GKChP which ousts the most radical hardliners, and the new leadership agrees to negotiate. The talks result in an amended New Union Treaty with concessions made to the conservative elements of the Communist Party that allow for a slow withdrawal of power and a promise to call free elections in 2 years. Mikhail Gorbachev remains President and the GKChP retains control over most of the military, at least for the time being. Soviet military formations are also recalled back to the motherland due to the collapse of Eastern European socialism and the Warsaw Pact during the Crisis of the Soviet Union, with the sole exception of the military bases in East Germany.

With this, the Soviet Union was preserved albeit in the form of the Union of Sovereign Soviet Republics, a state no longer constitutionally socialist and for a short time actually democratic. However, careerist factions of the Communist Party along with various new political figures and military officials eventually coalesced to found the conservative pro-Soviet Unity Party (Partiya Yedinstva) with Anatoliy Sobchak running for President and Alexander Rutskoy as Prime Minister.

The Unity Party went on to legitimately win the first fully free elections in 1994 as well as the elections of 1998, but has now transformed into an authoritarian party of power dedicated to the preservation of the Soviet idea but not necessarily communism, and has ruled the Union of Sovereign Soviet Republics ever since the amended New Union Treaty was signed.

Not much of note has occurred since then. The optimism of the new Soviet Union still exists at least in the more willing republics, as the Baltic states are still under a quasi-military occupation of sorts, and large scale immigration from Eastern Europeans fleeing the economic malaise of the former Warsaw Pact states has bolstered both the population of the USSR as well as greatly assisted propaganda efforts directed at the West.

Internally, factions within the Unity Party have appeared. The radical Augustrist faction represents the socialist, anti-liberal Soviet nationalist elements. The Novembrist faction represents the more social-liberal, social-democratic elements. However, the largest faction by far is the Neo-Bolshevist faction, which embodies the conservative, welfarist, state-capitalist direction the Soviet Union has taken since 1994.

When it comes to the old Communist Party of the Soviet Union, it is safe to say that it remains a powerful influence within society as it exists in a semi-official alliance with the ruling Unity Party, and it has been the second-largest party in the Supreme Soviet by a large margin since the end of Soviet communism. Additionally, some other opposition parties have been allowed to exist too, these being the (ironically named) authoritarian-nationalist Liberal Democratic Party, the autonomist/devolutionist Republican Party, the liberal-capitalist Civic Platform, the christian-interest Union for National Revival and the minor muslim-interest League of Rights and Freedoms.

Diplomatically, a border treaty was signed in the early 2000s with the People's Republic of China that gave them minor territorial concessions along the islets of the Amur River, and lately relations between the two powers have grown increasingly close, a development which is causing increasing frustration in Western strategic circles.

Geopolitically, the Soviet Union is no longer considered a superpower having lost all of its allies and satellites to reformist leftists or revolutions in the 1990s, even Mongolia still went democratic. Its military might is still without question though, and it has forged strong partnerships with many nearby countries, most notably Serbia, Iran and India. The Soviet Union also continues to loom over Europe in a rather threatening manner despite tensions with the US being relatively low, which is largely due to the Soviets neutrality in regards to the 2003 Invasion of Iraq.

This is a world where the geopolitical scene is more balanced, despite being mostly the same, and even though it is a dream come true for Gennady Zyuganov he might be rather disappointed to hear that while the Soviet Union is still around, Soviet communism is considered by most to be a thing of the past.

Description
The Soviet Union is dead, long live the Soviet Union!

That is the catchphrase of the 1990s in what is still known as the USSR, but other than abbreviations and a few titles is very different from the Soviet state that we are familiar with from the Cold War.

In this timeline the August Coup consolidates control over the Soviet state more effectively in the ensuing days and weeks, as they manage to arrest and detain Boris Yeltsin but fail to capture Mikhail Gorbachev, who demands the putschist GKChP to step down with pressure from the international community. The hardliners however do not relent, and violently suppress a relatively small but energetic uprising by furious Muscovites, which sparks many abortive insurrections all over the Soviet Union. After three bloody months the Soviet Union is on the brink of a terrible civil war, with the world nervous over its potential for nuclear violence and a possible catastrophic spillover.

Unyielding to both fear and diplomatic pressure, the GKChP refuses to interact in any way with the internationally recognized Soviet government which at this stage had fled to Lvov, but in November 1991 a second coup occurs from within the GKChP which ousts the most radical hardliners, and the new leadership agrees to negotiate. The talks result in an amended New Union Treaty with concessions made to the conservative elements of the Communist Party that allow for a slow withdrawal of power and a promise to call free elections in 2 years. Mikhail Gorbachev remains President and the GKChP retains control over most of the military, at least for the time being. Soviet military formations are also recalled back to the motherland due to the collapse of Eastern European socialism and the Warsaw Pact during the Crisis of the Soviet Union, with the sole exception of the military bases in East Germany.

With this, the Soviet Union was preserved albeit in the form of the Union of Sovereign Soviet Republics, a state no longer constitutionally socialist and for a short time actually democratic. However, careerist factions of the Communist Party along with various new political figures and military officials eventually coalesced to found the conservative pro-Soviet Unity Party (Partiya Yedinstva) with Anatoliy Sobchak running for President and Alexander Rutskoy as Prime Minister.

The Unity Party went on to legitimately win the first fully free elections in 1994 as well as the elections of 1998, but has now transformed into an authoritarian party of power dedicated to the preservation of the Soviet idea but not necessarily communism, and has ruled the Union of Sovereign Soviet Republics ever since the amended New Union Treaty was signed.

Not much of note has occurred since then. The optimism of the new Soviet Union still exists at least in the more willing republics, as the Baltic states are still under a quasi-military occupation of sorts, and large scale immigration from Eastern Europeans fleeing the economic malaise of the former Warsaw Pact states has bolstered both the population of the USSR as well as greatly assisted propaganda efforts directed at the West.

Internally, factions within the Unity Party have appeared. The radical Augustrist faction represents the socialist, anti-liberal Soviet nationalist elements. The Novembrist faction represents the more social-liberal, social-democratic elements. However, the largest faction by far is the Neo-Bolshevist faction, which embodies the conservative, welfarist, state-capitalist direction the Soviet Union has taken since 1994.

When it comes to the old Communist Party of the Soviet Union, it is safe to say that it remains a powerful influence within society as it exists in a semi-official alliance with the ruling Unity Party, and it has been the second-largest party in the Supreme Soviet by a large margin since the end of Soviet communism. Additionally, some other opposition parties have been allowed to exist too, these being the (ironically named) authoritarian-nationalist Liberal Democratic Party, the autonomist/devolutionist Republican Party, the liberal-capitalist Civic Platform, the christian-interest Union for National Revival and the minor muslim-interest League of Rights and Freedoms.

Diplomatically, a border treaty was signed in the early 2000s with the People's Republic of China that gave them minor territorial concessions along the islets of the Amur River, and lately relations between the two powers have grown increasingly close, a development which is causing increasing frustration in Western strategic circles.

Geopolitically, the Soviet Union is no longer considered a superpower having lost all of its allies and satellites to reformist leftists or revolutions in the 1990s, even Mongolia still went democratic. Its military might is still without question though, and it has forged strong partnerships with many nearby countries, most notably Serbia, Iran and India. The Soviet Union also continues to loom over Europe in a rather threatening manner despite tensions with the US being relatively low, which is largely due to the Soviets neutrality in regards to the 2003 Invasion of Iraq.

This is a world where the geopolitical scene is more balanced, despite being mostly the same, and even though it is a dream come true for Gennady Zyuganov he might be rather disappointed to hear that while the Soviet Union is still around, Soviet communism is considered by most to be a thing of the past.