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Civilians across Eastern Europe protested and helped bring about the fall of communism based on their belief that the West would bring a superior way of life, g

Civilians across Eastern Europe protested and helped bring about the fall of communism based on their belief that the West would bring a superior way of life, government, and economy to their countries. For whatever reason, it all failed. Assuming slightly higher oil prices than we have now, life under the USSR would likely be better. Some particularly egregious things the West / Wall Street did: 1. No plan to absorb the massive amount of laid off secret police and military members. These ppl would turn to organized crime very quickly. Same mistake made in Iraq in 2003. 2. Giving Russia garbage loans they were in no position to pay back and had to be repaid in dollars only. An absolute disaster that Goldman Sachs was mostly responsible for. 3. EU was completely unprepared, for what has now become, the greatest migration in human history. The best and brightest left Eastern Europe in droves, causing massive brain drain that helped usher in the collapse of regime after regime. 4. Sending a CIA team to Moscow in 1996 to directly override the wishes of the Russian people. In defense, the USA was worried in a reasonable way that the communist party would win in a landslide at the polls. But regardless that should have been their choice. 5. Not focusing on Afghanistan after leaving in the late 1980's, letting jihadism further spread to Chechyna and the devastating war from 1994-1996 their. Causes terrorism on a 9/11 scale in Moscow, hundreds of Russian tanks destroyed, just insanity. [2] - https://quillandquire.com/review/sale-of-the-century-russia-s-wild-ride-from-communism-to-capitalism/ https://quillandquire.com/review/sale-of-the-century-russia-... [4] - https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/17/sunday-review/russia-isnt-the-only-one-meddling-in-elections-we-do-it-too.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/17/sunday-review/russia-isnt... [5] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Chechen_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Chechen_War

apsec112 6y ago
Creating and implementing a plan to hire millions of people would have required much more intervention in Russia's internal affairs than just trying to push an election one way or the other.
pessimizer 6y ago
> No plan to absorb the massive amount of laid off secret police and military members. These ppl would turn to organized crime very quickly. Same mistake made in Iraq in 2003. We'd get the same thing if we actually defunded police and shrank the military in the US. We're one weak but aggressive left-wing elected government away from an American ISIL.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > We'd get the same thing if we actually defunded police and shrank the military in the US. Only if we did it stupidly. We've done a fairly good job of it in foreign occupations prior to the Iraq debacle (notably, post-WWII, the model that experts warned should be followed for Iraq but which was not), we could certainly manage to not screw it up at home as long as the political leadership paid attention to pragmatics as well as (not even “instrad of”) ideology. > We're one weak but aggressive left-wing elected government away from an American ISIL. We already have an American ISIL (a militant, fundamentalist, theocratic politico-religious group), and their allies in the formal political system already run the federal executive branch, dominate the federal judiciary, and control one of two houses of the federal legislature. Insofar as a failed political demobilization relates to them, it was the demobilization after the Civil War (which the battle flag of the losing side of that conflict remains one of their key symbols.)
  - pessimizer 6y ago
    > Only if we did it stupidly. Only if we did it with a weak government. We have an extremely right-wing military (except at the absolute top) and a completely right-wing police force. Without a mass movement, a weak left government is defenseless. > We already have an American ISIL (a militant, fundamentalist, theocratic politico-religious group), and their allies in the formal political system already run the federal executive branch, dominate the federal judiciary, and control one of two houses of the federal legislature. Call me when after they start beheading people in the street and taking over neighborhoods with armed street militias. We honestly have to make sure that our rhetoric resembles reality at least vaguely. Pretending like a Republican party that is doing the same thing it did under Nixon or Reagan is basically ISIL just makes people stop listening. We're watching armed rightist incursions into cities right now, ones that are officially becoming armed skirmishes with the police openly suppporting the invaders (and it's mutual.) Imagine what would happen if we laid off half the police force? It doesn't matter whether it's right or not; of course it's right. What matters is that a bunch of unemployed angry right-wingers with no productive skills and murder training will see the government and the people who voted for it as enemies. Like what woke liberals are literally doing right now, but without the middle-class liberal arts education and heavily armed. Having the Warren Court during a critical period of civil rights struggle has given liberals a tendency to magical thinking - like Q-followers, we're always waiting for the wise executive to move society forward by fiat. When we're at the point where we're expecting the CIA and FBI to take its place and reign in the elected president, we have to accept this strategy is not effective. We have to build power through having specific values and policies, like the right. You can't just tell an armed bully to stop being a bully because you've been elected the representative of the people he bullies. He doesn't have to do what you say. edit: > Insofar as a failed political demobilization relates to them, it was the demobilization after the Civil War (which the battle flag of the losing side of that conflict remains one of their key symbols.) This is what happened after the civil war https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_racial_violence_in_the_United_States#Post%E2%80%93Civil_War_and_Reconstruction_period:_1865%E2%80%931877 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_racial_violence_in_the_Un... American ISIL. And to celebrate the victory, statues of Confederate soldiers were erected all over the country. During that time a single-issue antislavery party that had defended the Union in a civil war over slavery (the Republicans) decided to virtually merge with the Democrats on racist policy. Those battle flags flew throughout the lands of a supposedly defeated enemy for at least the next century and a half.
thefounder 6y ago
>> For whatever reason, it all failed I think it did not for the simple fact that now you have more freedom that in the communist era. Now if want to talk about economy and equality that's a diffetent story. The results of a new democratic system like in any project depend by execution.

apsec112 6y ago

Creating and implementing a plan to hire millions of people would have required much more intervention in Russia's internal affairs than just trying to push an election one way or the other.

pessimizer 6y ago

> No plan to absorb the massive amount of laid off secret police and military members. These ppl would turn to organized crime very quickly. Same mistake made in Iraq in 2003. We'd get the same thing if we actually defunded police and shrank the military in the US. We're one weak but aggressive left-wing elected government away from an American ISIL.

dragonwriter 6y ago
> We'd get the same thing if we actually defunded police and shrank the military in the US. Only if we did it stupidly. We've done a fairly good job of it in foreign occupations prior to the Iraq debacle (notably, post-WWII, the model that experts warned should be followed for Iraq but which was not), we could certainly manage to not screw it up at home as long as the political leadership paid attention to pragmatics as well as (not even “instrad of”) ideology. > We're one weak but aggressive left-wing elected government away from an American ISIL. We already have an American ISIL (a militant, fundamentalist, theocratic politico-religious group), and their allies in the formal political system already run the federal executive branch, dominate the federal judiciary, and control one of two houses of the federal legislature. Insofar as a failed political demobilization relates to them, it was the demobilization after the Civil War (which the battle flag of the losing side of that conflict remains one of their key symbols.)
- pessimizer 6y ago
  > Only if we did it stupidly. Only if we did it with a weak government. We have an extremely right-wing military (except at the absolute top) and a completely right-wing police force. Without a mass movement, a weak left government is defenseless. > We already have an American ISIL (a militant, fundamentalist, theocratic politico-religious group), and their allies in the formal political system already run the federal executive branch, dominate the federal judiciary, and control one of two houses of the federal legislature. Call me when after they start beheading people in the street and taking over neighborhoods with armed street militias. We honestly have to make sure that our rhetoric resembles reality at least vaguely. Pretending like a Republican party that is doing the same thing it did under Nixon or Reagan is basically ISIL just makes people stop listening. We're watching armed rightist incursions into cities right now, ones that are officially becoming armed skirmishes with the police openly suppporting the invaders (and it's mutual.) Imagine what would happen if we laid off half the police force? It doesn't matter whether it's right or not; of course it's right. What matters is that a bunch of unemployed angry right-wingers with no productive skills and murder training will see the government and the people who voted for it as enemies. Like what woke liberals are literally doing right now, but without the middle-class liberal arts education and heavily armed. Having the Warren Court during a critical period of civil rights struggle has given liberals a tendency to magical thinking - like Q-followers, we're always waiting for the wise executive to move society forward by fiat. When we're at the point where we're expecting the CIA and FBI to take its place and reign in the elected president, we have to accept this strategy is not effective. We have to build power through having specific values and policies, like the right. You can't just tell an armed bully to stop being a bully because you've been elected the representative of the people he bullies. He doesn't have to do what you say. edit: > Insofar as a failed political demobilization relates to them, it was the demobilization after the Civil War (which the battle flag of the losing side of that conflict remains one of their key symbols.) This is what happened after the civil war https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_racial_violence_in_the_United_States#Post%E2%80%93Civil_War_and_Reconstruction_period:_1865%E2%80%931877 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_racial_violence_in_the_Un... American ISIL. And to celebrate the victory, statues of Confederate soldiers were erected all over the country. During that time a single-issue antislavery party that had defended the Union in a civil war over slavery (the Republicans) decided to virtually merge with the Democrats on racist policy. Those battle flags flew throughout the lands of a supposedly defeated enemy for at least the next century and a half.

thefounder 6y ago

>> For whatever reason, it all failed I think it did not for the simple fact that now you have more freedom that in the communist era. Now if want to talk about economy and equality that's a diffetent story. The results of a new democratic system like in any project depend by execution.