Thread: An alternative view of the USA & some other countries

Originally Posted by Basil77

Ok, Scott, I can understand you perfectly well, he was a guy whos leadership made your country a Cold War winner blah, blah. More important for Americans, I think, he was a leader who greatly improved the level of life-quality in America. But have you ever think by what cost? The foundation of policy of blowing American financial bubble was founded by Reagan's goverment. Have you ever thought about how much money an average American family owes to China goverment? And how much your grandchildren will owe if United States will continue current policy?

I disagree with your financial bubble comment - please look into FDR and Woodrow Wilson presidencies. I do agree that the USA financial policy is a disaster. It is not just Obama and democrats. It is Bush and republicans also. See the election coming up in November for what direction America thinks we should be going in.

I think it's ironic that Ronald Reagan is being discussed in a "Liberties of the Russian people" thread. I know there were many factors in the collapse of communism but isn't Ronald Reagan one of them? We'll never know but if Carter won again and then followed by other "weak" presidents like Obama - would you be able to freely have a discussion on the liberties of the Russian people?



Scott

Originally Posted by fortheether

I think it's ironic that Ronald Reagan is being discussed in a "Liberties of the Russian people" thread. I know there were many factors in the collapse of communism but isn't Ronald Reagan one of them? We'll never know but if Carter won again and then followed by other "weak" presidents like Obama - would you be able to freely have a discussion on the liberties of the Russian people?

Main reasons for USSR collapse were internal. At the end of USSR people didn't really believe in soviet ideals, propaganda etc. Everybody became cynic. But yes, maybe external factors played some role. Namely, maybe aggressiveness and insane rhetorics of Reagan prolonged USSR a bit more. He gave many good confirmations to communist propaganda. We'll never know...

Originally Posted by it-ogo

Main reasons for USSR collapse were internal. At the end of USSR people didn't really believe in soviet ideals, propaganda etc. Everybody became cynic. But yes, maybe external factors played some role. Namely, maybe aggressiveness and insane rhetorics of Reagan prolonged USSR a bit more. He gave many good confirmations to communist propaganda. We'll never know...

Can you please elaborate on the statement:

He gave many good confirmations to communist propaganda.

What did the propaganda say?

Thank you,

Scott

Originally Posted by fortheether

Can you please elaborate on the statement:

He gave many good confirmations to communist propaganda.

What did the propaganda say?

Thank you,

Scott

They said: "USA is our enemy. They hate us just because we are different, just because we are Russians. They want to destroy our country, split it into pieces. They call our country "Evil empire". All we want is to live in peace but they do not agree. They have military bases and nukes all around the USSR while USSR has no nukes near the USA. We propose mutual disarmament but they build SDI to be completely safe when they will bomb our cities. We have to unite against them to save our country and our lives. Just read what their president say and you will see. He hates us."

Funny that at the time of late USSR all of it was true. Sometimes even propaganda may be true.

Originally Posted by it-ogo

They said: "USA is our enemy. They hate us just because we are different, just because we are Russians. They want to destroy our country, split it into pieces. They call our country "Evil empire". All we want is to live in peace but they do not agree. They have military bases and nukes all around the USSR while USSR has no nukes near the USA. We propose mutual disarmament but they build SDI to be completely safe when they will bomb our cities. We have to unite against them to save our country and our lives. Just read what their president say and you will see. He hates us."

No, not like that. It would be too simple. They said that the capitalists who oppressed the worker class in many countries were afraid of the 'inevitable' triumph of the communism in the whole world. In order not to lose their wealth and power they strove to destroy the socialist countries. These were the reasons.

Originally Posted by it-ogo

They said: "USA is our enemy. They hate us just because we are different, just because we are Russians. They want to destroy our country, split it into pieces. They call our country "Evil empire". All we want is to live in peace but they do not agree. They have military bases and nukes all around the USSR while USSR has no nukes near the USA. We propose mutual disarmament but they build SDI to be completely safe when they will bomb our cities. We have to unite against them to save our country and our lives. Just read what their president say and you will see. He hates us."

Funny that at the time of late USSR all of it was true. Sometimes even propaganda may be true.

So the Soviet submarines with nuclear weapons in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans was propaganda? Until a minute ago I thought Nikita Khrushchev said when referring to the USA "We will bury you", but I looked it up:

We will bury you - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

which says he didn't say it. Most Americans think he said it.

Scott

Originally Posted by fortheether

So the Soviet submarines with nuclear weapons in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans was propaganda?

Those were real. As real as the nuclear silo installations across Western Europe. By the way, the SDI concept was next to useless against those subs.

As far as I remember, the war concepts of that time were based on not allowing the counterpart to launch the strategic (ballistic) missiles. Those were for the retaliation purpose only if one of the sides were to lose the war. The Soviet military concept was based on the principles of:

1. Sending the special forces to each and every nuclear silo to attack the silo personnel just hours before the war starts and thus prevent the launch of the strategic missiles.

2. Disrupt the command and the communication channels of the counterpart so that to prevent the orders to be issued or delivered. That included one-time mass-assassination of the major political figures and their deputies.

3. The sudden one-time shock attack on the air-carriers by means of the nuclear subs destroying the air fleet and getting the overwhelming dominance in the air.

4. The massive ground assault with the tanks which would be almost invincible given the Soviet dominance in the air.

As a result, the entire Europe would be conquered and the US paralyzed. Then the new leaders of the US would have no choice but to acknowledge the expansion of the Soviet Union in the entire Europe given the Soviet Union would leave the rest of the NATO members alone. As a consequence, the major communist revolutions would spark in Africa, Middle East, and Asia. Having NATO forces without decent command and inability to make the hasty vital decisions, those revolutions would most likely succeed. That would leave the Soviet Union expanded over the entire Eurasia and Africa continents. Those would be 'accepted' as the new soviet republics as additions to the already 15 present. The North and South America would be left alone. For how long?

Originally Posted by fortheether

Until a minute ago I thought Nikita Khrushchev said when referring to the USA "We will bury you", but I looked it up:

We will bury you - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

which says he didn't say it. Most Americans think he said it.

In the USSR even a better story circulated: he said it at the UN meeting, yelling and banging his shoe upon the desk to make his point more clear.
I don't know how many people actually believed that, but I did hear several people mentioning it as if it were a fact.

Originally Posted by E-learner

In the USSR even a better story circulated: he said it at the UN meeting, yelling and banging his shoe upon the desk to make his point more clear.
I don't know how many people actually believed that, but I did hear several people mentioning it as if it were a fact.

Originally Posted by fortheether

So the Soviet submarines with nuclear weapons in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans was propaganda?

If you remember, my point was that Reagan's aggressiveness probably prolonged life of USSR a bit more rather than shortened it. What I gave in quotation is not an exact formulations but a brief summary to provide a general idea of the point of Soviet propaganda so you can see that Reagan gave many good confirmations to it. Do you see?

Originally Posted by fortheether

Until a minute ago I thought Nikita Khrushchev said when referring to the USA "We will bury you", but I looked it up:

We will bury you - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

which says he didn't say it. Most Americans think he said it.

Yeah, he could say that. Khrushchev was old stinky pig, hysterical goop, very non-diplomatic. Sill he had one merit: during Caribbean crisis he was one who stopped. He was not ready to destroy the World for his ambitions like beautiful and noble Mr. Kennedy was. So there are words against deeds.

Originally Posted by fortheether

We'll never know but if Carter won again and then followed by other "weak" presidents like Obama - would you be able to freely have a discussion on the liberties of the Russian people?

Well, Misha Tal seems to enjoy the 'free' talk, so why not?

I'm not sure the reasons for the 'fall of the communism' are quite obvious. Like, look at North Korea. All the so-called 'reasons for the fall' are still there (and perhaps there are even more), but the present regime seems to be rather stable. Some people think at the August of 1991 the SU was very close to abandon the Perestroyka and going back to the roots (=the strong dictatorship).

Having said that, I remember the early '80s and all I can tell is that the SU seemed to be preparing for a big war. It was apparent the SU couldn't match the SDI and the preemptive strike was required to save the regime. Gorbachev allowed a lot of ugly things to happen, but he didn't allow the big war to start.