I may be missing something, but the fact that the Soviet Union collapsed relatively peacefully is not a lot of evidence for restraint/unwillingness to use force amongst its leaders. For the whole previous history of the Soviet Union repression and silencing of dissent was commonplace, especially during Lenin and Stalin (for example by the KGB torturing dissenting/intellectual people or sending them to gulags). Also, Gorbachev was a pretty uniquely commited to change in the context of USSR leadership, and there were plenty of other factors making dissolution more appealing. Opression definitely decreased as USSR neared its end, but why does this outweight the very violent first half of its existence?
I may be missing something, but the fact that the Soviet Union collapsed relatively peacefully is not a lot of evidence for restraint/unwillingness to use force amongst its leaders. For the whole previous history of the Soviet Union repression and silencing of dissent was commonplace, especially during Lenin and Stalin (for example by the KGB torturing dissenting/intellectual people or sending them to gulags). Also, Gorbachev was a pretty uniquely commited to change in the context of USSR leadership, and there were plenty of other factors making dissolution more appealing. Opression definitely decreased as USSR neared its end, but why does this outweight the very violent first half of its existence?