The treaty was signed in Moscow on May 26, 1972 by the President of the United States, Richard Nixon and the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Leonid Brezhnev ; and ratified by the US Senate on August 3, 1972.

It repeated this success in the Australian charts and was also featured in the film, Letter to Brezhnev.

The Brezhnev Doctrine (, ) was a Soviet Union foreign policy, first and most clearly outlined by S. Kovalev in a September 26, 1968 Pravda article, entitled " Sovereignty and the International Obligations of Socialist Countries.

The Brezhnev Doctrine stayed in effect until it was finally ended with the Soviet non-invasion of Poland during the 1980-1981 crisis and later refusal of Mikhail Gorbachev to use military force when Poland held free elections in 1989 and Solidarity defeated the Communist Party.

On 14 October 1964 the Central Committee, alongside the Presidium, made it clear that Khrushchev himself did not fit the model of a " Leninist leader ", and he was forced to resign from all his post, and was succeeded by Leonid Brezhnev as First Secretary and Alexei Kosygin as Chairman of the Council of Ministers.

Brezhnev was able to succeed Khrushchev because a majority in the Central Committee voted in favour of removing Khrushchev from office as both First Secretary and Chairman of the Council of Ministers

The number of Central Committee meetings rose again when Brezhnev was elected First Secretary, but the number of meetings and their duration steadily decreased during Brezhnev's rule.

The speaker at the Central Committee meeting which elected the Council of Ministers ( the Government ) and the Politburo was never listed during the Brezhnev era.

Andropov was in a good position to take over the control of the party apparatus ; three big system hierarchs, Brezhnev, Kosygin and Suslov had all died.

Chernenko was elected as a compromise candidate by the Politburo ; the Central Committee could never have accepted another candidate, considering that the majority of the Central Committee members were old Brezhnev appointees.

The nomenklatura system came under attack ; several delegates asked why the leading party members had rights to a better life, at least materially, and why the leadership was more-or-less untouchable, as they had been under Leonid Brezhnev, even if their incompetence was clear to everyone.

Its first chairman was Nikita Khrushchev, and he was succeeded in 1964 by Leonid Brezhnev.

But Andropov's ability to reshape the top leadership was constrained by his poor health and the influence of his rival ( and longtime ally of Leonid Brezhnev ) Konstantin Chernenko, who had previously supervised personnel matters in the Central Committee.

In 1960, after Brezhnev was named chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet ( titular head of state of the Soviet Union ), Chernenko became his chief of staff.

In 1964 Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev was deposed, and succeeded by Leonid Brezhnev.

During Brezhnev's final years, Chernenko became fully immersed in ideological Party work: Heading Soviet delegations abroad, accompanying Brezhnev to important meetings and conferences, and was a member of the commission that revised the Soviet Constitution in 1977.

Within three years of the deaths of Soviet Leaders Leonid Brezhnev, Yuri Andropov, and Konstantin Chernenko, Gorbachev was elected General Secretary by the Politburo in 1985.

Andrei P. Kirilenko, a Politburo member and Central Committee secretary under Brezhnev, was first secretary of the regional committee of Dnipropetrovsk.

Finally, Nikolai A. Shchelokov, minister of internal affairs under Brezhnev, was a former chairman of the Dnipropetrovsk soviet.

Novotný then invited Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev to Prague that December, seeking support ; but Brezhnev was surprised at the extent of the opposition to Novotný and thus supported his removal as Czechoslovakia's leader.

Hungary's János Kádár was highly supportive of Dubček's appointment in January, but Leonid Brezhnev and others grew concerned about Dubček's reforms, which they feared might weaken the position of the Communist Bloc during the Cold War.

During the Brezhnev Era the collective leadership was able to limit the powers of the General Secretary.

When the earthquake hit on the morning of December 7, 1988, the houses and apartments least able to resist collapse were those built during the Brezhnev years.

Since the US Project Gemini reversed the Soviet lead in human space exploration by 1966, Korolev was able to persuade Leonid Brezhnev to let him pursue his plans to make a lunar landing before the US.

At the 23rd Congress of the CPSU held in 1966, Brezhnev was able to have himself declared General Secretary of the party, reviving a title that had not existed since Stalin.

In 1964, the Central Committee ousted Khrushchev from power, and elected Leonid Brezhnev as First Secretary.

In the Brezhnev era, for instance, delegates at Party Congresses lost the power to vote in secret against candidates endorsed by the leadership.

Following Khrushchev's fall from power, Soviet leader Brezhnev brought Voroshilov out of retirement into a figurehead political post.

Seven years later, Leonid Brezhnev, a client of Khrushchev, helped to remove his boss from power.

The Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union then elected Gorbachev chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, giving Gorbachev the attributes of power that previously Leonid Brezhnev had.

* October 14 – 15 – Nikita Khrushchev is deposed as leader of the Soviet Union ; Leonid Brezhnev and Alexei Kosygin assume power.

When Leonid Brezhnev came to power in 1964, the usual leather footwear returned to shops, and rubber boots quickly lost their popularity, returning to their original role of utility footwear.

When Brezhnev died in 1982, he was succeeded by Yuri Andropov, who died quickly after taking power.

After Leonid Brezhnev assumed power in 1964, much of Khruschev's reforms were reversed.

Konstantin Chernenko, another old Brezhnev protégé, became a " counterweight " to Kirilenko's power within the Central Committee ( CC ).

The decision to remove Kirilenko was taken before Andropov rose to power, so in the event Brezhnev had died later, Kirilenko would still have been forced to resign.

Having led the opposition against Khrushchev for years, Suslov had acquired and wielded great power within the Central Committee when Brezhnev rose to power.

After the ousting of Khrushchev, Leonid Brezhnev took power and Ustinov returned to the defense industry.

This corruption was common during the Brezhnev era, and the nomenklatura ( the power elite of the country, usually corrupt Communist officials ) ran the country along with criminal bosses.

In 1964 Khrushchev was forced to step down in a coup that brought Leonid Brezhnev to power.

Brezhnev could count on only five votes, while another seven Politburo members were opposed to granting Brezhnev more power ; removing Podgorny would in fact mean the end of the collective leadership.

Podgorny's removal from office in 1977 has become the most notable example of power transfer in the late Brezhnev Era.

When Brezhnev died in November 1982, the Soviet Union he handed over to his successor, Andropov, was much less dynamic than when he assumed power.

In 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev rose to power in Moscow and introduced a new foreign policy, which led to the termination of the Brezhnev doctrine.

Khrushchev's treatment of his opponents marked a departure from earlier practice in Soviet politics ( as last seen in 1953 during the purge of Lavrenti Beria )-a development that was followed during later power struggles, such as Khrushchev's own deposition by Brezhnev in 1964 and the failed coup against Mikhail Gorbachev in August 1991.

KGB chairman Yuri Andropov reportedly struggled for power with Leonid Brezhnev.

Brezhnev in return helped Khrushchev by tipping the balance of power during several critical confrontations with the conservative hard-liners, including the ouster of pro-Stalinists headed by Molotov and Malenkov.