# Forum About Russia Culture and History  Positive Aspects of the Cold War

## Martin Miles

I have an interest in the history of the Cold War, so I thought I would start a topic on the subject with a provocative title. We all know about the bad side of the stand-off between the two superpowers, but there must have been positive aspects too.
The one that comes first to my mind is the advances in technology that came about because of the space race including, of course, the ability to reach other heavenly bodies. That may actually come in handy some day.
In terms of politics, it was good that neither superpower was able to behave exactly as it pleased. The War in Iraq would never have taken place during the Cold War.
Can you think of other favourable sides of the confrontation? 
Кстати, Ким Филби, известный разведчик времени холодной войны, родился 1 января 1912 года:  http://www.peoples.ru/military/scout/filbi/ 
С новым годом!

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## fortheether

I disagree with your statement: 
In terms of politics, it was good that neither superpower was able to behave exactly as it pleased. The War in Iraq would never have taken place during the Cold War. 
Of course it's not the same thing but the Soviet war in Afghanistan did occur during the cold war.  So did Korea and Vietnam and the Cuban missile crisis.  
Except for what you mentioned about the space race the only positive I see from the cold war was Boris and Natasha:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_and_Natasha   
Scott

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## Basil77

> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_and_Natasha

 fortheether, are you sure it's a correct link?  ::

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## fortheether

> Originally Posted by fortheether  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_and_Natasha   fortheether, are you sure it's a correct link?

 It is - Boris and Natasha were on the Rocky and Bullwinkle show.

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## Hanna

> It is - Boris and Natasha were on the Rocky and Bullwinkle show.

 Never heard of this show.  
The cold war was too depressing to even write about. Some stuff happened while I grew up in the 1980s in Sweden, on the Baltic Sea coast, but frankly I just think it's depressing to think about it. It's all history.  
Think what could have been achieved if both sides had spent all that effort on research, building welfare in their own countries, or in poorer countries.  
We could have colonies on Mars  ::   or improved life in the third world  ::  
Imagine if the USSR and US had been able to work together.  
Instead, the world has enough nuclear weapons   ::   to kill the entire population of the earth, 18 times over. That's what was what the cold war produced! What's good about it -- nothing!  
The awkward thing is that there seem to be plenty who'd like to get Cold War 2 started... for cynical economic and other reasons.

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## starrysky

Yeeees... 
I find it really hard to see any positive aspects of the Cold War... I can find positive aspects about the Soviet Union but apparently it wasn't possible to have the Soviet Union without the Cold War -- since the Cold War ended only with the dissolution of the USSR. Which is a shame. Russia's image became really marred in the world and it has done us no good. Then again, I think it was pretty much inevitable, so... As the saying goes: "History doesn't know the subjunctive mood." ("История не знает сослагательного наклонения") Suppose the US tried to interfere with Russia's internal affairs -- you know, if we didn't develop the H-bomb and they said: "Hey, we don't like communism, why don't we just play the local magistrate and convince those Russians that democracy/capitalism is better by the force of arms?" All sorts of jokes are circulating even now -- along the lines of that washing powder commercial: "What, you still don't believe in democracy? Then we're flying to you!"     
But I have heard this arguement about "the balance of power". Prof. Ambrose who was an American historian said in the 1970s (see his interview in "The World At War" series): 
"... And eventually, what you get out of the end of WWII is that Russia and America confront each other around the world. Then you have to sort out what belongs to who. Who gets what out of the war. Lines have to be drawn. This is what the Truman doctrine really means, the doctrine of containment, that eventually came in 1947. This is what Churchill means by the "Iron Curtain." Much as he hated it and much as many people regret the imposition of the Iron Curtain, in fact, the Iron Curtain line in Europe turned out to be, rather like the division of Germany, the best thing. People knew who belonged to what, rather than what belonged to who. So that one of the unexpected results is that without having had a forml peace conference, you get a better settlement in Europe after WWII than you had in WWI. WWI, they all got down on their hands and knees on these gigantic maps and drew up the lines of where the new countries would be, with the Austria-Hungarian Empire broken up and the German Empire broken up and so on. And it looked like a very smooth and very intelligent settlement. In fact, of course, nothing was settled, as we learned in 1939, if not earlier. WWII, you get nothing like that kind of a settlement at the end of the war, so willy-nilly things fall into place and we have now had the longest peace Europe has enjoyed in modern times." 
So who knows?   ::  He's definitely right that the results of the peace Treaty of Versailles after WWI came down hard on the Germans and to some degree provoked WWII.   _The Treaty of Versailles was neither lenient enough to appease Germany, nor harsh enough to prevent it from becoming the dominant continental power again._
(from the Wiki) 
I have heard some talks (in foreign media) about "a new cold war" or "Mr Putin's cold war mentality." It's all bunk. But Russia was in a very difficult, insecure, humiliated even, position in the 1990s -- when our opinion was not heeded regarding Yugoslavia and so on. You might draw comparisons that psychologically we were similar to Germany after WWI. I was watching an interview on Euronews a few days ago with a former US foreign minister, I think -- I don't remember his name or exact post, unfortunately. He seemed a very intelligent man and he said that it was a mistake on the part of the US to disregard this issue. But even so, there's no need to talk about "cold wars" now -- Russia is not seeking to restore its former USSR boundaries like Hitler sought to take back Rhineland and Sudetenland and so on.

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## fortheether

> Originally Posted by Basil77        Originally Posted by fortheether  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_and_Natasha   fortheether, are you sure it's a correct link?    It is - Boris and Natasha were on the Rocky and Bullwinkle show.

 Some small clips (Boris and Natasha are Russian spies):   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hHUiCYAE2DY  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHqy-chPMnM&feature=fvw  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CuWhgyGW ... re=related    
Scott

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## Martin Miles

> Of course it's not the same thing but the Soviet war in Afghanistan did occur during the cold war. So did Korea and Vietnam and the Cuban missile crisis.

  You are right, Russia in Afghanistan, a neighbour, and the U.S. in Iraq, half way around the world, _are_ quite different. The Soviets failed in their war because of, at least in part, U.S. support of their enemies. That supports the point I was making about no one superpower being able to do just what it wanted.   

> Except for what you mentioned about the space race the only positive I see from the cold war was Boris and Natasha:

 A big exception, but more on that later.   

> Think what could have been achieved if both sides had spent all that effort on research, building welfare in their own countries, or in poorer countries.

 I touched on the question of research earlier. On welfare, quite a few Russians feel that they were better looked after by the State during the Cold War than after it: http://otvet.mail.ru/question/32990338/ 
As for poorer countries, I don't know about all of them, but some actually fared worse after the Cold War because nobody wished to buy their support anymore. There was famine in Cuba in the 90s with people eating domestic cats and animals from the zoo:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Period/ Cuba has probably recovered now, but nearly 20 years after the end of the Cold War, the poor countries of the world are still, in many cases,though not all, no better off than they were during the stand-off.   

> We could have colonies on Mars

  Maybe, maybe not; as Starrysky says: History has no subjunctive mood. 
Remember, I am not trying to say that the Cold War was a good thing, but that, as the Russians say: нет худа без добра.

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## Hanna

Oh, I understand Martin. Good post, interesting to hear your perspective. Starrysky's post was very interesting, as usual. I really am really not sure if I should give an opinion here, in the presence of a whole community of "experts"...  ::   But for what it's worth:  
The USSR could have been a really great country, for its' own citizens,  I think. There seems to have been a lot of good will and good intentions.  My view on it while I was growing up in Sweden was nothing like the standard American view of an oppressive and aggressive society. It seemed great from films and documentaries. I think I believed that it was morally superior somehow, to the USA, but a more restrictive kind of society which obviously was negative. Then I changed my mind when I started watching more American films as I got older, and times changed. 
In the 1990s it seemed that everyone thought the USSR was absolutely terrible in every respect. Even people who had previously been supporters.  
In East Germany it seems lots of people miss the old days. I know a person who has this opinion.  He said (when he was drunk) that he'd like to turn back the clock and stop the unification of Germany, and he stuck to this even when me and another person brought up some of the darker sides of the DDR.  
Lots of the problems and bad things that happened in the USSR seems to have been caused by the paranoia of the state about its' external and internal enemies. I agree that it is fascinating in a way, but I think it's more important to take an interest in what happens right now and what the future will be like.

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## vox05

> for its_ own citizens,

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## starrysky

I am certainly anything but an expert when it comes to politics and history.   ::   I don't even venture into the politics section of my local forum -- there are such sharks there.  ::  Though when I do read something I disagree with most posters anyway. But I have been interested in history on and off ever since I read Dumas at the age of ten. Don't mind my talking about WWII too much, it just so happens that this was a 'WWII year' for me -- I read some books, both fiction and historical ones, and saw some films which I hadn't seen previously... History in general is not a subject most young people are strong at -- a friend of mine after finishing school couldn't tell when WWII/the Great Patriotic War happened and who 'won'... 
But Cold War is an interesting topic in its own right. I think I'll at least read the wiki entry when I've got some spare time. I do regret the damage it has done to Russia's image which I believe it did to some degree... Oh well. Intelligent people will always look through the stereotypes -- it's a country's good people and culture that matter not politics...

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## Martin Miles

Some of the spin offs of the space race include the CAT scan and MRI technologies found in most hospitals today: http://spaceracehistory.tripod.com/spin.shtml/   

> History in general is not a subject most young people are strong at

  

> I agree that it is fascinating in a way, but I think it's more important to take an interest in what happens right now and what the future will be like.

 When the topic of the importance of history comes up, I like to recall two quotations. One from Cicero: To be unaware of what happened before you were born, is to be forever a child; and another anonymous one: Sometimes in order to go forward, it is necessary to look back. In other words, yes, the future is what matters, but you can't effectively plan for tomorrow without thinking about yesterday.

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## Hanna

Stars, If you are going to read the English speaking info about it, just remember that "the winner writes the history" and the US / NATO is fantastically competent at portraying itself as the "good guys" who stand for liberty, human rights, etc, etc...  I'm not sure I'd bother reading it if I was Russian because it's a very unflattering picture of the country that your parents grew up in...  
The only reason I never fully bought into this rhetoric  is because I remember the different perspective from when I was younger and lived in a neutral country. But every single person in the UK for example, it is an absolute given that the USSR was an incredibly nasty country in every possible respect. Because Hollywood and media said so... This leads to a very suspicious view of modern Russia.  
I have visited a few countries in Asia where the people still feel sick at what was done to them in the name of "freedom" and stopping them from becoming communist. They should have been left alone to mind their own business...  Visiting a few museums in such places is a real eye opener. I know they have agendas too, and that they probably aren't particularly objective.. But they hardly destroyed every single building in the entire country and killed half the male population just for propaganda purposes.. VERY disturbing stuff.  
There is a very disturbing trend that more and more of the EU members are also NATO members. I really don't like this, *precisely for the Cold War associations.* It achieves nothing productive! It annoys Russia for no good reason, creates un-necessary tension and costs a lot of money.  If Finland and Sweden can manage without being in NATO, then so can Poland and the Czechs, in my opinion. But maybe the idea of playing war together with the US right on Russia's border is too tempting for some other countries to resist...  
I hate the meddling of foreign powers in Europe, whether from East or West. In the case of Russia it is at least partly European though. I understand that Germans are not really in a position to make a fuss about foreign bases on their territories even though some people there clearly don't like it. But as for the rest, including Norway, Spain and the UK, I just don't understand them.   
I don't want US bases across Europe today any more than I would have wanted unwelcome Soviet bases during the Cold war. What happens the day we have a serious disagreement with the USA and they just "happen" to have 200,000 troops right next to London, Frankfurt, Madrid etc? 
As far as I am concerned, the Cold War is completely over when Europe is free from foreign troops and we have good relations both East and West.

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## Martin Miles

Кто "помнит" это?   
You may know about this already, but no history of the Cold War is complete, Starrysky, without a mention of the Fischer-Spassky match of 1972 where, during the tense days of the stand-off, an American plays a Russian ("takes on the Soviet chess machine") in a contest to decide who would be chess champion of the world. Nobody knew it at the time, but the result foreshadowed the eventual outcome of the Cold War 20 years later.

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## Basil77

> Nobody knew it at the time, but the result foreshadowed the eventual outcome of the Cold War 20 years later.

 It's just stupid.  ::

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## Martin Miles

Basil, думаю, что вы не поняли меня. I am not saying that the victory of the American in the match _led_ to the demise of the Soviet Union, simply that it _foreshadowed_ it. In other words, in 1972 Fischer beat Spassky, and in 1991 the U.S. defeated the U.S.S.R., so the first event foreshadowed the second, there is no statement that one caused the other.

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## Basil77

Я прекрасно понял. А Вы в курсе чем кончил Бобби Фишер? Смотрите как бы и вы, победители хреновы, там не оказались.

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## Hanna

Good picture of the stamp! 
I happen to be a fan of Fisher, since I like chess. He is an interesting person, a genius, of course. I would have liked to meet him.  
But if you are going to use him in the example, don't forget that resigned his position as grand-master, rejected the chess establishment and Western society in general. He became strongly anti-american to the point that he renounced his American citizenship.  
Has this got a relevance to the allegory or not?  
He was buried in Reykjavik and was an Icelandic citizen when he died! 
A lot of chess people thought that he had gone crazy. Who knows? He was completely coherent at any rate. I read an article he read quite late in life and it was good.

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## Aimak

Прошу прощения, но я буду писать по-русски (мне сложно это перевести на английский).
Позитивные аспекты "холодной войны"? Я считаю, что они есть и в достаточно большом количестве.
Первое, что приходит на ум - это технологии, которыми м сейчас пользуемся на бытовом уровне. Тот же интернет. Это технология двойного назначения.GPS, медицинские разработки, химическая промышленность, металлургия и т.д. Недавно я натолкнулся на книгу "Двойные технологии" - сколько же много было разработано! Жаль что это в России не нашло широкого применения.
В начале 90-х годов в России существовала легенда, что развал СССР был спланирован, пройдет немного времени и все вернется на свои места, но в другом качестве. История развивается по спирали, и многие вещи в современной России начинают напоминать СССР - та же самая вертикаль власти. Появилось (пока на бумаге) новое экономическое объединение Россия - Беларусь - Казахстан. Я более чем уверен, что это будет жизнеспособное дитя.
Что до развала СССР, то мое личное мнение - правильно. Солько же можно было развивать экономики других стран и Союзных Республик, а самим ходить голыми (это не касалось только Москвы и Питера)?
Освоение далекого космоса? А надо ли строить баы на Маре? Еще Земля до конца не изучена. Ближний космос изучен больше, чем мировой океан, в Сибири есть земли, где буквально не ступала нога цивилизованного человека.

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## Martin Miles

That's right Aimak, the Internet itself has its origins in the Cold War, the basic technology was developed for military purposes:  http://www.davesite.com/webstation/net-history.shtml 
I think everyone would agree, that's quite a positive spin-off. 
Basil, if you understood me, I don't see how you could call my statement of fact "stupid". Unless you are saying that Fischer didn't really win in Iceland, or that the Soviet Union didn't really collapse. As you know, the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. never openly fought each other, and the Soviets used victories in sport, in general, and chess, in particular, as ways of demonstrating the superiority of their system, so when Fischer played Spassky it was regarded as a test of the two ideologies. The observation I made is quite easy to see, I admit, but it was directed at Starrysky who is interested in the Cold War, but who, for all I know, may not play chess and so might not have heard of the match. 
It's true Johanna, Bobby Fischer lost it in the end, but as you say, he _was_ a genius. The games he left behind, and the opportunities he created for other players in the West to make a living out of chess are far more important than the controvrsial statements of an aging man sadly suffering from mental illness. You say it was a good picture I posted. Thank you. Something of the personalities of the two men comes through in the drawing: Spassky is genial, good natured but a little weak; Fischer is self-assured with maybe a hint of arrogance.

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## starrysky

I have heard of this particular game but I don't think it registered as an important event... My Dad loves chess and sports in general so he often goes on about something sports-related (I usually take only half notice as I'm not so passionate about sports). He taught me ... er... the basics of chess. As for foreshadowing -- I don't know... It's a bit difficult for me to judge because I didn't live then.  Any victory or defeat can then be seen as "foreshadowing." But it's absolutely true that this match was especially important and a lot of people followed it. Sports events were often looked upon in that way you describe, Martin, as evidence of USSR superiority. But the way Fischer ended could be seen as a sort of portent that "Something is rotten in the State of Denmarke."  ::   
What I dislike now is that sports events are again being made into more than what they are. It seems that political expectations are being placed on whether Russia 'won' or 'lost' in a football match. Those things suddenly become the most important items on the news. Football matches are becoming a sort of national frenzy. Perhaps I'm just not as much of a fan but I rather dislike it all. 
The one thing that was better in the USSR was _music_. There is heart and soul in the songs of that time. I was listening to some of the war-time songs yesterday, like "В землянке" -- they touch your soul in a way no modern songs do... Our modern "эстрада" is a crowd of idiots, like the former hairdresser Sergei Zverev turned "singer" -- the effiminate victim of "glamour" and plastic surgery. The thing that seems to matter most in today's singers (Russian, at least) is appearance. They have to voice, their songs are stupid and nonsensical to distraction and all they seem to care about is "stardom." There are exceptions, of course, all this idiocy is enough to make me wanna puke evey time I see some "Kirkorov"...   ::  Such 'flowers' would never have been allowed to blossom on the Soviet soil but, to be fair, there were other idiots in abundance...      

> I have visited a few countries in Asia where the people still feel sick at what was done to them in the name of "freedom" and stopping them from becoming communist. They should have been left alone to mind their own business...

 There's a good proverb in Russian "Со своим уставом в чужой монастырь не ходят" (one doesn't go with his own regulations into a strange monastery) which roughly corresponds to the English "When in Rome do as the Romans do." But of course no one minds folk wisdom... USSR was guilty of it too but I happen to have a balanced view on my country's past -- there were good sides to it, and there were bad sides to it, same as with capitalism. Besides better music   ::  there were no homeless people in the streets, everyone had a job and people were more sure of their future than they are now. But the arms race sucked a lot of money for the military needs hence the USSR backwardness in terms of consumer goods... These are all truisms and well-known facts though...

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## Aimak

Да Советская музыка .... Нынешней эстраде далеко до прошлого. Но это все благодаря цензуре. По поводу гонки вооружений - много средств было вложено в это.
По поводу спортивнух достижений. В фашисткой Германии (незадолго перед войной) победу немецких спорсменов объясняли превосходством арийской рассы.

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## Martin Miles

> As for foreshadowing -- I don't know... It's a bit difficult for me to judge because I didn't live then. Any victory or defeat can then be seen as "foreshadowing."

  

> But the way Fischer ended could be seen as a sort of portent that "Something is rotten in the State of Denmarke."

  

> А Вы в курсе чем кончил Бобби Фишер? Смотрите как бы и вы, победители хреновы, там не оказались.

 Both of you seem to like the foreshadowing idea, at least sometimes. Исправляюсь: захотел сказать, что резултаты матча и войны были интересное совпадение. That was what I meant by "foreshadow". Strictly speaking, I suppose I could have expressed myself more accurately. And Denmark has no 'e'.

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## Hanna

I really don't think this chess match bore any relevance to what was to come in the cold war. It was just a milestone game between two very talented players who happened to come from different superpowers. Plus it was the first time for decades (I think) that the US had managed to beat Russia at chess. 
It's a mystery (to me) why the USSR went under. All I can think is that people got fed up with certain aspects of life in the USSR and that the government was no longer willing to apply force to stay in power and keep the union together. The dissolving of this superpower will surely go down in history as something very unique! I think that in a hundred years people will wonder how a superpower just "gave up" without even facing an external enemy... Perhaps there was something psychological involved.  I don't think there is any similar example at all in history. It's not surprising to hear that there are conspiracy theories about it. 
I don't think the US "won" the cold war per se... it's more a case that it was the only player left in the game...  
I don't consider it to have any moral superiority. I'd guess that the same amount of people have died in wars that the US started, as the number of people who died as the result of brutal policies in the early years of the USSR. Possibly many more. A human life is worth the same amount whether the person is American, Russian, Vietnamese or Afghan...  
I like countries that take good care of its own citizens and treat them with respect.. And leaves other countries alone instead of meddling and starting wars.

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## Basil77

Ok, Martin, I get your point. Sorry, if I insulted you - I was dead drunk when I posted above.  ::  But I still think the parallel between Fisher's victory and collapse of USSR is st.. er.. not proper. Let me remind you that the next chess champion was Anatoliy Karpov, again from USSR.  And I personally think that the greatest result of Fisher's victory was the song  ::  :  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WvI0NmLmP-4 part 1  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvOLRiQ8mTY part 2 
P.S. About U.S. "victory" in cold war. Imagine: two people are playing some stupid game. Then one of them suddenly realises that while he was playing there are some serious problems occured in his personal life. He tells his partner: " Sorry, I'm quit playing, I have far more important buisness right now." And the partner yells: "Ah, afraid? Then I won! Yehha!!!" Get my point?   ::

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## Martin Miles

I'm certainly not arguing that Fischer-Spassky had any bearing on the outcome of the Cold War, only,as I said above, that it was an interesting coincidence that they both turned out the same way, given the huge significance that was attached to the encounter at the time. 
Whether people then were right to see it as a battle of East versus West rather than just another match is something that could be discussed. What may be relevant here is that Fischer was very much an individualist, doing everything on his own steam, and so could be seen as a good embodiment of Western ideas about the value of individualism and enterprise, whereas the Soviets were more collaborative, communal, if you like, and there were allegations that if two Russians played each other in a tournament the result might be fixed.
And to be fair, Fischer really was enterprising, because in his day, nobody in America took chess seriously, or made a living from it, and then he came from nowhere and more or less singlehandedly won the World Championship. You may not be head over heels in love with the US, Johanna, and neither am I, but you have to admire that kind of spirit.
So in the end there is some justification for seeing Reykjavik 1972 as more than just another match between opponents who just happened to come from different superpowers.

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## Hanna

> P.S. About U.S. "victory" in cold war. Imagine: two people are playing some stupid game. Then one of them suddenly realises that while he was playing there are some serious problems occured in his personal life. He tells his partner: " Sorry, I'm quit playing, I have far more important buisness right now." And the partner yells: "Ah, afraid? Then I won! Yehha!!!" Get my point?

 That's an absolutely fantastic and quite funny allegory.   ::   ::   ::  
Haha, you're a lot sharper when you don't drink before posting here... guess it's just the holiday season...  But luckily drinking doesn't seem to make you quite as outrageous as Dogboy...  Speaking of which...  I wonder what kind of "diplomatic" commment  Dogboy will be making about the outcome of the cold war....   
Also, speaking about chess players & politics. I'm interested to hear about Kasparov and what he stands for (or opposes). All I know is that he has got involved in politics, in an opposition party. I have a very high view of him; he's practically like a living legend, from a chess perpective. But from what I understand, Putin does not share my appreciation of him...  Don't know why.  _Good Vysotskij songs! I did not know he had made songs about chess. He's yet another genius person for sure...  _   _@Martin, actually I quite like a lot of things about the US including the people, many aspects of the culture and the amazing nature. I just dislike it's foreign policy, plus lately it's unwillingness to make an effort in environmental issues._

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## Martin Miles

> About U.S. "victory" in cold war. Imagine: two people are playing some stupid game. Then one of them suddenly realises that while he was playing there are some serious problems occured in his personal life. He tells his partner: " Sorry, I'm quit playing, I have far more important buisness right now." And the partner yells: "Ah, afraid? Then I won! Yehha!!!" Get my point?

 It's a nice analogy, Basil. Btw, I remember when the Soviet Union collapsed some academic rushed into print with a book claiming that because democracy had triumphed history had effectively come to an end.
The weakness of your comparison is that the Cold War was not just a trivial game unrelated to more important things, it was a big contest about which superpower had the better  social/political/economic system. So if one opponent had to withdraw because his empire fell apart (the serious, personal problems of your analogy) then it suggests that the other contestant won because his system of government was better. In other words, the personal problems are really part of the game.
But I am not saying the last word has been written. We have to see how things work out between the U.S. and China in this century.

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## starrysky

> Ok, Martin, I get your point. Sorry, if I insulted you - I was dead drunk when I posted above.

 *ха. так я и знала*   ::  I knew there was something about the tone of that comment...    

> And Denmark has no 'e'.

 I know it doesn't but it's Shakespeare -- that's how it was written where I copied it from. This quote is rather famous in Russia -- "что-то не так в Датском королевстве/не всё прекрасно в Датском королевстве."   

> Нынешней эстраде далеко до прошлого.

 Надоели они мне все до смерти, пугачевы эти.   ::  Ни одного любимого певца/певицы русских нет. Ну "Любэ" неплохо, но они ещё "оттуда."   

> That's an absolutely fantastic and quite funny allegory.

 Yes, Basil hit the nail on the head. If it hadn't been for Gorbachev, we might still be living in the USSR. It wasn't so much the question of losing as quitting. A different person came to power... Then again, that's what the USA wanted, so... The communist dream and the Soviet way of life was a bit of utopia, a beautiful dream, as Ramil said somewhere I believe but an unworking system. I wish we could have a socialist state, like Sweden. Maybe that's what we're heading for?   ::  I do think it is, actually. I used to vote for democrats because I was brought up to believe capitalism, democracy=good, communism=bad. But the democratic parties seem very much in the shadows now and I've slightly changed my views...

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## Martin Miles

The line from Hamlet, is, of course, part of everyday English, like so much else written by Shakespeare. Since English spelling was standardised after the Bard wrote his plays, and because it is part of everyday language, no native English speaker would normally write "Denmarke" instead of "Denmark" eventhough Shakespeare spelt it that way.  ::  
On your last point, I often find that the opinions that are most easily comprehended are often the least interesting since they are just repetitions of things I've heard too many times before, whereas originality is frequently difficult to understand at first.

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## Aimak

> ="starrysky"Надоели они мне все до смерти, пугачевы эти.   Ни одного любимого певца/певицы русских нет. Ну "Любэ" неплохо, но они ещё "оттуда.".

  
You have forgot Трофима. His last songs not bad.

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## Hanna

> What I dislike now is that sports events are again being made into more than what they are. It seems that political expectations are being placed on whether Russia 'won' or 'lost' in a football match. Those things suddenly become the most important items on the news. Football matches are becoming a sort of national frenzy. Perhaps I'm just not as much of a fan but I rather dislike it all.

 Yes, well if people only read about  
   -The love life and weight of celebrities
   -Football and other sports
   -Freak occurrences, i.e. "My dog drowned my cat in the toilet"
   -What is the EXACT latest style of jeans to wear... 
etc...  
Instead of politics, economy, education, healthcare.... 
.....then polticians and capitalists can continue to run things the way they please without too much interference from regular people. Convenient!  
"Junk news" are addictive actually. If you start reading about it, you want to read more!  And whether people watch 24 hour news channels, or listen to the news on the radio, they still get essentially the same things.  
I agree that it is totally hyped.  
About a year ago my cable TV broke for two weeks and I can't get terrestrial TV because of the location of my building by the river. So I had no TV for two weeks and realised it was a very good thing. I never really got back to watching TV after that, and it is very liberating.

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## Martin Miles

> Ok, Martin, I get your point. Sorry, if I insulted you - I was dead drunk when I posted above.  But I still think the parallel between Fis[c]her's victory and collapse of USSR is st.. er.. not proper.

 Можем разрешать это на шахматной доске.  ::

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## starrysky

Well, I'd already written this post but it disappeared in the Great Collapse of a few days ago...   ::   
Anyway, I've recently watched this programme about a curious episode from the times of the Cold War. 50 years ago, on January 17, 1960, a Soviet self-propelled barge T-36 broke away from its pier on the Kuril Islands due to heavy weather and was set adrift in the Pacific Ocean. The crew, which consisted of 4 soldiers -- a Russian, a Tatar, and two Ukrainians -- had no means of communication and hardly any food -- one loaf of bread and 16 potatoes covered in black oil. The barge was damaged and as they drifted in the area, where the Soviet missiles were tested and navigation was forbidden, no ship could find them. They ate the bread in two days and had to split the remaining potatoes. But even so, they were soon reduced to boiling and eating their leather belts, wristlets, and even boots. They had virtually no water either, except rainwater. Sharks accompanied the barge continually. Finally, after 49 days of drifting in the sea, on March 7, starved and dying, the soldiers were found by an American aircraft carrier "Kearsarge." Here's its report http://www.history.navy.mil/wars/kearsage.htm.  
It is interesting that at first, dying as they were, the four men were unwilling to be taken to the American ship as they considered it "surrendering to the enemy." They were treated very well by the Americans, of course -- given a lot of food, which they had to refuse at first because they knew that in such cases, eating too much after having been so starved could prove fatal. Very soon, they were called heroes in the American media and asked how they managed to retain their humanity and didn't start fighting and trying to kill each other for food, which other people in similar situations had been known to do, to which they answered that they were Soviet people and that Soviet people are friends and brothers to each other. But at the same time they feared that on coming back home they would be labelled "traitors" for surrendering to the enemy and sent to prison camps (which they might have been, had Stalin been alive). They were offered political asylum in the US but refused it. 
In fact, they were received as heroes in the Soviet Union and became very popular. Some children started to refuse normal food and tried boiling boots -- they wanted to be heroes and tested their ability to survive in extreme conditions. The name of the junior sergeant Askhat Ziganshin (the Tatar) who was the superior in rank of the four entered into lyrics: "Зиганшин буги, Зиганшин рок, Зиганшин ест второй сапог". Vladimir Vysotsky wrote a song about their ordeal called "Сорок девять дней" ("49 days").      
The tv programme that I watched is called "Их могли не спасти. Узники Курильского квадрата" and it's available online.       
Interviews: http://www.ogoniok.com/archive/2002/4744/16-28-30/ http://www.bulvar.com.ua/arch/2005/488-9/42246f4135d8b/ http://smena.ru/news/2006/06/14/7793/

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## Zombie Acorn

Does anyone know any good books that tell the cold war from the perspective of the CCCP but translated into English?

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## Basil77

I recommend "TASS Is Authorized to Declare" by Julian Semenov. It's written like fiction novel, but the whole plot based on real facts, even some names kept unchanged. The plot is about spies, the action takes place in early 80s. Point of view is typical for USSR: KGB=good guys, CIA=bad guys. There are TV series based on this novel, but I liked the book more. Unfortunately I have no idea if it was translated into English.

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## Ramil

I would also recommend two movies from my childhood:  *Incident At Map Grid 36-80 (Случай в квадрате 36-80)*
Plot summary:
While on maneuvers, a Soviet naval flagship picks up a distress call from an American submarine carrying a secret nuclear arsenal. When the sub's computer malfunctions and gives the order to launch the cruise missiles, the American commander warns the Soviets. The opposing admirals must decide the fate of the nuclear sub. 
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0085723/   *Solo Voyage (Одиночное плавание)*
Plot Summary: 
It is the peak of the Cold War. A TV journalist stands on a US aircraft carrier, interviewing the ship's commander. The commander talks about the current military maneuvers of the US fleet. Among other things, the commander points out a shape of an unknown warship on the horizon, speaking about the Russians. According to the commander, they constantly track American wargames.
At the same time, a man in the uniform of a high-ranking American military officer meets Jack Hessalt, a veteran of the Vietnam war. The military officer, a CIA agent, appoints US Army Major Jack Hessalt to be in charge of a missile command post inside a secret US military base in the Pacific Ocean. Jack is still troubled by memories of Vietnam, and realizes that he has no way out.
While the US and Russian ships spy on each other in the zone of the Pacific military maneuvers, a single Russian frigate moves nearby a group of small islands. The combat patrol of the ship completed, she moves to Russian waters. After arriving at the US military base, Hessalt receives a secret order to launch a missile with a conventional warhead at the foreign civil ship. The CIA has planned this operation in order to blame a ship of the Soviet fleet for the unsuccessful launch of a missile. The aim of the operation is to prevent the upcoming Soviet-American summit by discrediting the Soviet authorities. Jack understands that his entire crew will be murdered immediately after the completion of the operation. There are also a few desperate guys inside the base who see the situation Hessalt's way. Finally, Jack decides to take full control of the base. Jack and his allies seize an intermediate-range missile equipped with a nuclear warhead, and are ready to make a suicidal attack on the Russian frigate that is approaching the islands where the US secret base is located.
The Soviet command decides to send a group of marines to the island, led by Major Shatokhin, who are faced with the difficult assignment of preventing an incident that could lead to World War III. 
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089721/

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## BappaBa

I like a serial about secret agent Tulyev.  *The Secret Agent's Blunder/Ошибка резидента* 1968   *The Secret Agent's Destiny/Судьба резидента* 1970   *The Secret Agent's Return/Возвращение резидента* 1982   *The End of Operation/Конец операции резидент* 1986

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## Ramil

[s:3bxyt9mg]Secret agent[/s:3bxyt9mg] resident.  
IMO

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## BappaBa

> [s:1g6462nk]Secret agent[/s:1g6462nk] resident.

 Т.е. секретный агент работает на своей территории, а резидент "засланный казачок"?

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## Ramil

> Originally Posted by Ramil  [s:35mzugnj]Secret agent[/s:35mzugnj] resident.   Т.е. секретный агент работает на своей территории, а резидент "засланный казачок"?

 ХЗ, просто мне кажется, что резидент (в значении разведчик) - это калька с "их" термина.

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## it-ogo

Вроде бы резидент - постоянно живущий на чужой территории агент, работающий по месту проживания (в отличие от агентов обеспечения, обычно приезжающих откуда-нибудь на разовую акцию). Кроме того, на советском развеччицком сленге резидентом назывался руководитель всей сети, работающей в какой-то стране. (Обычно такой резидент базировался в посольстве и имел дипломатическое прикрытие). 
Разведчик же - слишком общее понятие. Это и тот, кто сидит в кабинете в своей столице и руководит, и тот, кто ходит через линию фронта за языком.

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## Ramil

Вопрос в том, как этот резидент на английский переводится. 
Вот, кстати, что даёт Мультитран:
resident; fixed-post spy; chief of station (ЦРУ); resident agent; station commander (ЦРУ); fixed agent (разведки); resident agent (разведки)

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## Hanna

::  _Be careful Zombie Acorn, or you'll find that you start wondering if the right side really "won" the cold war... !_ 
---------------------------------------------- 
I want to comment on some of the things that Starrysky said earlier.  
1) Interesting story about the submarine crew! Brave guys! I hope they are having a comfortable retirement. 
2)  

> I wish we could have a socialist state, like Sweden. Maybe that's what we're heading for?

 _Social democracy is "Socialism Lite"! Pink and fluffy socialism... Yeah, you should have tried it, in my opinion. You got ripped off, it's terrible..._  
Sweden is social democratic though, so the socialists get voted out of government every now and then (once every 15 years on average, for 3 years). 
During that period their polices are scrutinised and revised a bit. Some of their *seriously* socialist initiatives get rolled back.  However ALL major political parties are VERY similar, they only differ in minor nuances. If they tried dismantling the welfare state people would not put up with it.  
SD can be incredibly irritating, but fundamentally they are well-meaning and not corrupt. I have nothing major against them.  
It was a REAL surprise for me and a lot of other people when it turned out that most Russians were in fact NOT socialists/communists and had just been "playing along"!  In Sweden, the 50% or so who are socialists are completely genuine.  
Everyone (socialist or not) in Sweden believes in free universities, free healthcare and guaranteed housing. 
The idea that anyone should be denied an education, healthcare or decent housing is completely unacceptable to everyone.  
But of course, we always had private ownership of houses (for those who want it) and private businesses. Lately also private schools. So it is NOT real socialism and it has never aimed for communism at all.

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## DDT

President Eisenhower’s Special Assistant for Cold War Strategy was Nelson Rockefeller. All of the Rockefellers are part of the conspiracy to form a new world order. The Cold War was used as part of their strategy.

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## DDT

> Everyone (socialist or not) in Sweden believes in free universities, free healthcare and guaranteed housing. 
> The idea that anyone should be denied an education, healthcare or decent housing is completely unacceptable to everyone.

 That's good because if there is even one person in Sweden who is not a Socialist it means that everyone else in Sweden is a thief?

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## Hanna

> Originally Posted by Johanna  Everyone (socialist or not) in Sweden believes in free universities, free healthcare and guaranteed housing. 
> The idea that anyone should be denied an education, healthcare or decent housing is completely unacceptable to everyone.   That's good because if there is even one person in Sweden who is not a Socialist it means that everyone else in Sweden is a thief?

 Like I said, this is not socialism as in Eastern Europe pre-1991 so there is no reason to get too worked up!    _Sorry everyone, I suffer from the homesickness here in England, and trying to cure it by ranting about Sweden.... I should probably stop it.. But if anyone wants to hear about Vikings, midnight sun, midsummer or anything else typically Swedish, just let me know... Back on topic: Russia! _

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## DDT

> _Sorry everyone, I suffer from the homesickness here in England, and trying to cure it by ranting about Sweden.... I should probably stop it.. But if anyone wants to hear about Vikings, midnight sun, midsummer or anything else typically Swedish, just let me know... Back on topic: Russia! _

 OK Johanna. My ancestors were Vikings. They lived in Norway. Later in 1800s, my family sailed from Bergen to New Zealand and found a new home. I want to hear about "Vikings"!

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## capecoddah

> Originally Posted by Basil77        Originally Posted by fortheether  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boris_and_Natasha   fortheether, are you sure it's a correct link?    It is - Boris and Natasha were on the Rocky and Bullwinkle show.

 They were from "Pottsylvania" 
Every year I ask my maids to translate "Я ищу лоси и белка.".
It's a cheap laugh, but always good  ::   
'Rocky & Bullwinkle': Happy 50th birthday to the sweet duo! (And Boris and Natasha, too!) 
19 November 2009 12:53 PM, PST | EW.com - PopWatch | See recent EW.com - PopWatch news » 
It was exactly 50 years ago today that a little show called Rocky and His Friends debuted on ABC, bringing an animated crew of kooky characters — led by the naive Rocky and Bullwinkle and constantly scheming Natasha and Boris — into the American pop culture menagerie. The genius of Rocky & Bullwinkle, which was so simple in its clever madness, could be easily overlooked, if you wanted. But how many animated series are out there — especially today — that are so sweet and completely watchable?

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