Gorbachev did not attempt to arrest Yeltsin, but neither was he giving up. He believed that the newly created Commonwealth was illegitimate and would not last, while the Union could and should be saved. The next two weeks in Moscow would witness the highest human and political drama since the failure of the August coup, with Gorbachev and Yeltsin contending for the support of the republican leaders, their parliaments, top military commanders, and the international community in a struggle whose stakes were the future of the Soviet Union and the world political order.
