6 ms·

Yeah, it's not like they were the predominant threat to the US for ~50 years. Not everyone on HN is in their twenties.

geomark 7y ago
I was around for a lot of that. It was utter BS. Right up until when the Soviet Union fell apart the US gov and all its spook agencies were constantly screaming warnings of a Soviet breakout that would surely wipe us out. I was working at a defense contractor during that time so was pretty close to it.
- adrianN 7y ago
  More than once it was the decision of a single soldier not to press the button that saved our collective asses from nuclear war.
- paganel 7y ago
  It's true that no Western "sovietologist" had predicted the sudden fall of the Eastern Block, but that doesn't mean that the West and the countries that were under Soviet influence weren't enemies. Source: me, a guy that grew up in an Eastern European country and who was imbued with my country's propaganda during my childhood. And to make it even more OT: the "war" between West and East was won by the West the moment when people in the East started almost revering physical objects coming from the West, such as blue jeans. I remember that growing up in the '80s my mother's only jeans dress had an almost mythical status, it was THE one piece of clothing from our family's wardrobe that had that extra thing. I remembered of that feeling this past weekend while watching a Russian movie describing the '80s as lived on the Eastern side of the Wall (the movie is called "Leto" [1], I highly recommend it), during which movie one of the female characters highly wishes to purchase a pair of jeans for herself, if only she would have had the money. It is my intuition that the Western sovietologists from back in the day didn't have access to this type of information on the real feelings of the people living in Eastern Europe and in the former USSR, they were looking mostly at translated articles from Pravda and at satellite photos of rocket-launch sites in order to predict the health of the system. Turns out they were looking at the wrong stuff. [1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7342838/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7342838/
  - pauljurczak 7y ago
    > the "war" between West and East was won by the West Not so fast. The most populous country and the largest world economy by purchasing power parity is communist China. The physical objects people revere are likely made there or in neighboring communist Vietnam.
    - paganel 7y ago
      China is basically a Western country now, I mean it runs on the same capitalistic principles as the nominally Western countries, with some extra dystopian elements thrown in the mix. The pre-1989 clash between East and West was a real clash of the worlds, of different visions on how the future should look like.
  - geomark 7y ago
    I think those translated articles and satellite photos were just used as cover for western spook agencies' real agenda, which was constant budget increases to fund their pet programs and line the pockets of cronies (just like the war against terrorism later).

I was around for a lot of that. It was utter BS. Right up until when the Soviet Union fell apart the US gov and all its spook agencies were constantly screaming warnings of a Soviet breakout that would surely wipe us out. I was working at a defense contractor during that time so was pretty close to it.

adrianN 7y ago
More than once it was the decision of a single soldier not to press the button that saved our collective asses from nuclear war.
paganel 7y ago
It's true that no Western "sovietologist" had predicted the sudden fall of the Eastern Block, but that doesn't mean that the West and the countries that were under Soviet influence weren't enemies. Source: me, a guy that grew up in an Eastern European country and who was imbued with my country's propaganda during my childhood. And to make it even more OT: the "war" between West and East was won by the West the moment when people in the East started almost revering physical objects coming from the West, such as blue jeans. I remember that growing up in the '80s my mother's only jeans dress had an almost mythical status, it was THE one piece of clothing from our family's wardrobe that had that extra thing. I remembered of that feeling this past weekend while watching a Russian movie describing the '80s as lived on the Eastern side of the Wall (the movie is called "Leto" [1], I highly recommend it), during which movie one of the female characters highly wishes to purchase a pair of jeans for herself, if only she would have had the money. It is my intuition that the Western sovietologists from back in the day didn't have access to this type of information on the real feelings of the people living in Eastern Europe and in the former USSR, they were looking mostly at translated articles from Pravda and at satellite photos of rocket-launch sites in order to predict the health of the system. Turns out they were looking at the wrong stuff. [1] https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7342838/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7342838/
- pauljurczak 7y ago
  > the "war" between West and East was won by the West Not so fast. The most populous country and the largest world economy by purchasing power parity is communist China. The physical objects people revere are likely made there or in neighboring communist Vietnam.
  - paganel 7y ago
    China is basically a Western country now, I mean it runs on the same capitalistic principles as the nominally Western countries, with some extra dystopian elements thrown in the mix. The pre-1989 clash between East and West was a real clash of the worlds, of different visions on how the future should look like.
- geomark 7y ago
  I think those translated articles and satellite photos were just used as cover for western spook agencies' real agenda, which was constant budget increases to fund their pet programs and line the pockets of cronies (just like the war against terrorism later).