  We propose a simple explanation for the connection between chiral symmetry
restoration and deconfinement in QCD at high temperature. In the Higgs
description of the QCD vacuum both spontaneous chiral symmetry breaking and
effective gluon masses are generated by the condensate of a color octet
quark-antiquark pair. The transition to the high temperature state proceeds by
the melting of this condensate. Quarks and gluons become (approximately)
massless at the same critical temperature. For instanton-dominated effective
multiquark interactions and three light quarks with equal mass we find a first
order phase transition at a critical temperature around 170 MeV.
