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From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

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Re: From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

#71

Post by pqtyw »

Yeul wrote: post #65
pavpanchekha wrote: post #4

To summarize: the post is phrased in terms of an existing controversy about whether Gorbachev was "powerless" in the face of the bureaucracy (and how much he feared a coup), but concludes he wasn't. Instead, the author thinks Gorbachev was quite powerful, but focused on the wrong things, specifically on political reform instead of economic reform. Critical economic reforms like price reform was abandoned, and at the…

Gorbatsjov listened to American advisors. The Chinese were watching and never made the same mistakes. Opening up the economy so that Western piggus can take over everything and corrupt the nation with their DMARKS and Dollars? What were they thinking...

It wasn't a "nation" though. It was an empire that could only be held together by force and oppression.

Re: From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

#72

Post by pqtyw »

soco wrote: post #45
Analemma_ wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The post mentions parallels to the Qing Dynasty, but I want to elaborate on that a little more: whenever an authoritarian system which derives its authority from something other than nationalism (Imperial authority for the Qing, Communist ideology and the Party for the USSR) tries to modernize and liberalize, the danger is that this awakens slumbering nationalism which tears the system apart faster than it can safely…

I wonder, did that nationalism need so little time to get such a powerful force? I mean, Gorbachev was not that long in office, so maybe it was there all along just barely kept in check.

Same reason the Warsaw pact and communism in all East/Central European countries collapsed at the same time. It could only survive as long as there was a credible threat of Soviet invasion.

Same applied to almost all of the national "republics". Most people were only willing along with it due to fear and hopelessness (since any type of civil disobedience would be violently suppressed).

Re: From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

#73

Post by pqtyw »

UncleOxidant wrote: post #37
twilo wrote: post #33

I’ve always wondered how the world would look like without the Bolshevik revolution

Yeah, Lenin's complete takeover of the socialist/communist movement was not a given. Kerensky was much more of a moderate (and IIRC was running the Provisional Government from about July 1917 till about September, up until that point the Bolsheviks were in the minority). Had he succeeded and Lenin been unsuccessful in taking over the revolution it seems possible that Russia now might look more like a northern Europea…

> seems possible that Russia now might look more like a northern European

Probably not. Kerensky and most other moderates were still reactionary imperialists by modern standards and wanted to keep the empire together.

And the divergence between Russia and Norther European countries occurred hundreds of years prior to the revolution. Overwhelming majority of Russians were very poor and illiterate peasants. It would be near impossible to build a progressive/democratic society in such a place without massive economic and social changes (which wouldn't just happened on their own).

> he essentially outworked

He was also an extreme liar and a hypocrite. The Bolsheviks did and said anything to get into power and then reneged on most of their promises. Main issues at the time were land reform and ending the war, the Bolsheviks pretty much just stole the Socialist land reform plan and pretended they'll implement it when they get into power (which likely resulted in much less direct opposition to them in the early stages than would have been the case otherwise). Yet they obviously nationalized most of the land as soon as they secured their position. They also tried invading Poland/Ukraine/Baltics/etc. as soon as the German army withdrew.

Re: From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

#74

Post by watwut »

Muromec wrote: post #62
Eliah_Lakhin wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A huge part of China's success stems from the fact that Nixon opened up U.S. markets to China, along with U.S. investment capital. It was a key strategic decision made by the United States to counter Soviet influence in Asia. China's reforms were merely an adaptation to the new opportunities that arose from this shift. Another important factor was China's significantly larger population compared to the Soviet Union,…

>After WWII, significant male losses and the effects of the second demographic transition led to continuous population decline. Wait, but this simply isnt true. USSR population grew continiusly until the 90iez. The was the "war echo" in this growth, but it wasn't declining. You cant really beat 3 year maternity leave and free kindergarder from the age of 3. All that really worked and beinf a single mother was normali…

What really worked was that people were not invested in jobs. It was dead end, you dont care, dont have ambitions and try to go home as soon as possible. The 3 year maternity leave stayed after communisms ended, free kindergarten stayed. But capitalism made the work feel less of "sleepy dead end" for everyone.

Otherwise said, people stopped having kids when economic opportunities opened up.

Re: From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

#75

Post by pqtyw »

Muromec wrote: post #63
UncleOxidant wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In any case, the world without the Soviet Union is undoubtedly a better place. Is it, though? Putin's Russia is no better than the Soviet Union - in some ways worse. It's essentially a mafia state run by one thug. One could imagine a different scenario where Gorbachev would have been able to land the plane in a bit more of a controlled fashion and stayed around to transition to something that would look more like a…

It transitioned into a demicracy a-okay, the problem was -- russians never had any kind of democracy and it quickly descended into oligarchy, from which they overcorrected to dictatorship quite willingly. Every other ussr and soviet-aligned country got it going somehow.

> into a demicracy a-okay

Well considering that Yeltsin had to order the army to shell the Russian parliament less than 2 years after the USSR was dissolved that somewhat arguable.

Re: From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

#76

Post by pqtyw »

mlinhares wrote: post #23
bad_user wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm from Romania, and IMO the comparisons with the US make no sense, as the actual comparison should be what happened to the countries in the Warsaw Pact before and after USSR's collapse. Well, those that entered the EU are now far better off by all the metrics that count, and you can take your pick from GDP, income or life expectancy. This didn't happen for all the countries under USSR, depending on whether they sta…

I think the main difference is that if you were a US friend in Europe or Asia it would be an improvement, if you were so in Latin America or Africa it would be pretty bad.

I'm not sure if most African countries that were friendly with the Soviets did that well either.

Re: From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

#77

Post by rahen »

pqtyw wrote: post #71
Yeul wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gorbatsjov listened to American advisors. The Chinese were watching and never made the same mistakes. Opening up the economy so that Western piggus can take over everything and corrupt the nation with their DMARKS and Dollars? What were they thinking...

It wasn't a "nation" though. It was an empire that could only be held together by force and oppression.

But isn't China the same? Tibet and Xinjiang are both nations with their own language and culture. I guess it wouldn’t be long until they became independent again if it weren’t for force and oppression.

Re: From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

#78

Post by pqtyw »

tehjoker wrote: post #24
arp242 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're seriously bringing on Afghanistan as an example here? Because the Soviet Union has completely clean hands here...? And no, the United States is not perfect. No country with that amount of power is. But for all its flaws, it's vastly better than the Soviet Union ever was, but for the people living there and internationally. This is the old "the United States is horrible and has done terrible thing, so let's for…

My point was that the US went on and on with operation cyclone as it tried to turn Afghanistan into the Soviet Union's Vietnam and then did it to ourselves a few decades later. Incredible self-own.

Unlike the Soviets US didn't try to impose a "colonial" style administration in Afghanistan. They had no long-term plan and the local Afghan government they were propping up was exceptionally corrupt and incompetent.

Militarily US didn't much better than the Soviets and could've won relatively easily if they used similar methods and comparable goals.

Re: From Reform to Ruin in the USSR

#80

Post by pqtyw »

Eliah_Lakhin wrote: post #28
MaxPock wrote: post #14

The Soviet Union began to collapse the moment it abandoned Lenin’s NEP. If they had reintroduced it in the 1960s, after recovering from World War II, they could have quickly caught up with the West—perhaps even surpassed it. In many ways, China is the successful version of the USSR.

A huge part of China's success stems from the fact that Nixon opened up U.S. markets to China, along with U.S. investment capital. It was a key strategic decision made by the United States to counter Soviet influence in Asia. China's reforms were merely an adaptation to the new opportunities that arose from this shift. Another important factor was China's significantly larger population compared to the Soviet Union,…

> develop such an enormous landmass

Why would that matter? Australia and Canada are doing reasonably well regardless of the overwhelming majority of their territories being empty "wasteland" (economically).

If anything relatively low population coupled with huge amounts of natural resources per capita is one of the best positions to be in.

>relinquish part of its global influence and territory

By in and large their relinquished the more highly populated areas not the empty ones.

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