<P> Thousands of Muscovites came out to defend the White House (the Russian Federation's parliament and Yeltsin's office), the symbolic seat of Russian sovereignty at the time . The organizers tried but ultimately failed to arrest Yeltsin, who rallied opposition to the coup by making speeches from atop a tank . The special forces dispatched by the coup leaders took up positions near the White House, but members refused to storm the barricaded building . The coup leaders also neglected to jam foreign news broadcasts, so many Muscovites watched it unfold live on CNN . Even the isolated Gorbachev was able to stay abreast of developments by tuning into the BBC World Service on a small transistor radio . </P> <P> After three days, on August 21, 1991, the coup collapsed . The organizers were detained and Gorbachev was reinstated as president, albeit with his power much depleted . </P> <P> On August 24, 1991, Gorbachev dissolved the Central Committee of the CPSU, resigned as the party's general secretary, and dissolved all party units in the government . Five days later, the Supreme Soviet indefinitely suspended all CPSU activity on Soviet territory, effectively ending Communist rule in the Soviet Union and dissolving the only remaining unifying force in the country . Gorbachev established a State Council of the Soviet Union on 5 September, designed to bring him and the highest officials of the remaining republics into a collective leadership, able to appoint a premier of the Soviet Union; it never functioned properly, though Ivan Silayev de facto took the post through the Committee on the Operational Management of the Soviet Economy and the Interstate Economic Committee and tried to form a government though with rapidly reducing powers . </P> <P> The Soviet Union collapsed with dramatic speed in the last quarter of 1991 . Between August and December, 10 republics declared their independence, largely out of fear of another coup . By the end of September, Gorbachev no longer had the authority to influence events outside of Moscow . He was challenged even there by Yeltsin, who had begun taking over what remained of the Soviet government, including the Kremlin . </P>

When did communism in the soviet union collapse
find me the text answering this question