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Mikhail Gorbachev has died

reuters.com

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Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#881

Post by morelisp »

jwr wrote: post #708
ironcurtain wrote: post #661

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very much like Hawaii and Florida, weren’t they? Weren’t those countries ruled for decade or so by dictators who ceased power in late 20s? Didn’t Soviet actually organized elections and then their parliaments voted to join the USSR? I’m sure it’s all a sham but history is a bit nuanced.

I'm not sure if you are serious, but just in case: no, this is very much not like Hawaii and Florida. We are talking about countries with history, that were forcibly annexed by the Soviet Union. Also, there are no elections or parliaments anywhere within the Soviet (or Russian, for that matter) sphere of influence. There are "elections" and "parliaments".

> no, this is very much not like Hawaii and Florida. We are talking about countries with history, that were forcibly annexed

So how is this not like Hawaii?

It's a matter of US law that "the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaii occurred with the active participation of agents and citizens of the United States and further acknowledges that the Native Hawaiian people never directly relinquished to the United States their claims to their inherent sovereignty as a people over their national lands."

(The US didn't comport itself very well in Florida - or anywhere really - but I'll at least grant a difference in kind.)

Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#882

Post by fennecfoxy »

danbruc wrote: post #743
rixrax wrote: post #680

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the dissolution of soviet union is not over yet. You can see this nowhere as clearly as in russias attack on Ukraine[0] where imperialistic russians that dream of restoring the glory and borders of soviet union[1] are waging their genocidal war. Meanwhile they are using hunger[2] and energy as their weapons against the rest of the world[3]. If the russians are not stopped in Ukraine, then there is no reason to be…

From your link [1]. He [Putin] became briefly close to President George W Bush - who even claimed to have glimpsed Putin's soul - until the Iraq War drove them apart. In Iraq, Putin insisted that international law must be upheld - no invasion could be allowed without approval from the United Nations Security Council, and that approval was not forthcoming. This is also Putin and it is not singular. If you listen to hi…

Ah yes, plenty of respecting international law when it has come to assassinations etc in foreign countries.

Putin only care about international law where it is in his own interests.

Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#883

Post by romwell »

avmich wrote: post #598
romwell wrote: post #523

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hindsight is 20/20, sure, but the 90s were a time where a lot of people didn't have anything to eat, a time where everyone's life savings turned to dust overnight, a time where many people ended up homeless, a time where highly educated people became unemployed without warning (or couldn't get salaries for years on end) and were better off sweeping streets than working at science institutes... And that set a basis fo…

> but the 90s were a time where a lot of people didn't have anything to eat, a time where True, it was a quite big transformation of lives for everybody - fortunately without a major civil war, though with many lesser wars in less centralized regions. Yet the result was an improvement on average, in Russia it started to feel in 1999, and even earlier in Baltic countries. Wouldn't be sure about Asian countries though.

Sure, but 8 years of turmoil without a "major" civil war (but two Chechen wars with massive destruction and causlties) is a very, very low bar.

Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#884

Post by INTPenis »

flavius29663 wrote: post #10
INTPenis wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle, in the sense that it never ended. It only took a back seat in the media while Russia was disorganized.

it ended for 150 or so million people in Eastern Europe, that were freed from Russia.

I'm not trying to be contrarian here but I'd say their cold war just began when the soviet union disintegrated. Because now their new cold war was Russia exerting influence over them and manipulating their governance.

Which is what Ukraine has suffered these last 30+ years.

Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#885

Post by lapcat »

jorblumesea wrote: post #875
lapcat wrote: post #406

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you study geopolitics and history Please don't make assumptions about what other people have or haven't studied. > They also have a long, long history of authoritarianism. You could say the same about the Axis powers in WW2.

I think it's pretty clear that many people here lack historical and geo political context. "Can you believe Russia would invade to get a warm water port?!" Yes, I would. Btw your analogy of "why isn't germany authoritarian" is off the mark, because the Russians and NATO completely dismantled the existing power structures post ww2 through force. We did not do anything close to that post cold war. In fact the communist…

> I think it's pretty clear that many people here lack historical and geo political context.

> "Can you believe Russia would invade to get a warm water port?!"

> Yes, I would.

You couldn't have a more blatant straw man argument.

I'm not going to reply to you anymore. All you're doing here is chest beating.

Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#886

Post by insane_dreamer »

nsajko wrote: post #475
insane_dreamer wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeltsin is very much to blame. Russia would have transitioned much better if Gorbachev had been the head of the post-USSR Russia instead of Yeltsin. That said, the former Soviet Republics that transitioned well are those that were smaller, already edging their way towards a market economy before the USSR collapse, and received substantial help from (and eventually joined) the EU (Baltics, Hungary, Poland, Czech Rep.,…

Correction: Poland and Czechoslovakia weren't Soviet Republics, and Slovenia (Yugoslavia) wasn't even in the USSR sphere of influence.

Yes, of course, I was thinking East Bloc and wrote Soviet Republics instead.

Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#887

Post by insane_dreamer »

insane_dreamer wrote: post #369
bhupy wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The transition to a market economy went very well for most of the former Soviet Republics except Russia. https://economistwritingeveryday.com/2022/03/16/the-transiti... A lot of Russia's issues stem from the way the government sold off their state owned corporations, which created artificial monopoly/oligopoly owners overnight — often insiders/cronies to begin with. This can be contrasted with traditional market econ…

Yeltsin is very much to blame. Russia would have transitioned much better if Gorbachev had been the head of the post-USSR Russia instead of Yeltsin. That said, the former Soviet Republics that transitioned well are those that were smaller, already edging their way towards a market economy before the USSR collapse, and received substantial help from (and eventually joined) the EU (Baltics, Hungary, Poland, Czech Rep.,…

Correction: "East Bloc", not "Soviet Republics"

Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#888

Post by insane_dreamer »

nradov wrote: post #465
insane_dreamer wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeltsin is very much to blame. Russia would have transitioned much better if Gorbachev had been the head of the post-USSR Russia instead of Yeltsin. That said, the former Soviet Republics that transitioned well are those that were smaller, already edging their way towards a market economy before the USSR collapse, and received substantial help from (and eventually joined) the EU (Baltics, Hungary, Poland, Czech Rep.,…

The data doesn't support your point about inequality. The other former Communist eastern European countries generally don't have particularly high Gini index values. Other countries have much more income inequality. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SI.POV.GINI

I wasn't saying that they have high inequality, just that GDP/Capita isn't necessarily a good measure of prosperity

Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#889

Post by ajross »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #706
ajross wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Democracy does not imply friend of or aligned with the West. It seems like it does, though? I mean, no, it's not like India or Brazil are subjugated client states of the US or Germany or whatever, but they know where their natural allies are and which direction the wind blows in international relationships. Market democracies are going to stick together, if for no other reason than because they'll end up poorer if…

Germany is dominated by the US since WWII (having been invaded and occupied) in the same way Japan is. India is neither aligned nor allied with the US. They share interests particularly when it comes to containing China. But again India's interests on this have nothing to do with being a democracy or with China not being a democracy. The US are of course heavily involved in Brazil, including by supporting the militar…

> India is neither aligned nor allied with the US. They share interests

Which is pretty much what I said, no?

> particularly when it comes to containing China. But again India's interests on this have nothing to do with being a democracy or with China not being a democracy.

But... it is. India can trust the US, to be blunt, not to shit in the bed of international commerce and trade. India can trust, on balance[1], that if it provides valuable exports that the US will consume them and that if the US has a product on the market India will be able to buy it. India can not trust China or Russia to operate in the same kind of good-faith/mutual-interest paradigm.

And the reason is that the US government is constrained by its populace, who don't like it when stuff gets expensive. Putin and Xi are not so constrained (to different extents, Putin is far more of a rogue actor), and are free to take actions in direct contravention of international norms if they think it's in their "long term" best interests. Democracies can't do that.

[1] Yes, there are always exceptions. But they don't involve "lemme just outlaw all your products and invade my neighbor, 'K?"

Re: Mikhail Gorbachev has died

#890

Post by simonh »

pydry wrote: post #879
simonh wrote: post #867

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia has had problems with insubordination too, with soldiers refusing to fight. Frankly I don't see how it makes any difference. None of that makes Ukraine a fascist state. Nor does it change the fact that when it suits it's own interests, Russia promotes and funds fascists. Clearly none of this has anything to do with fascism, Russia didn't send massive columns of armoured vehicles and thousands of troops at Kyiv…

Im not sure you could argue that Ukraine is overall a fascist state. Zelensky isnt secretly one of them and lord knows they werent good at winning elections when they ran either. However, with a lot of fascists rewarded with government posts after their performance in maidan and an entire fascist batallion somehow having the independence to defy a presidential order to stand down in a war , it's pretty clear that fas…

They have power over themselves and their actions, they have little or no power or real influence in the country. They're certainly not making it in any way fascist. In fact the only reason they have any standing at all is due to the Russian aggression, if the Russian's hadn't invaded Azov would be truly irrelevant.
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