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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Ali Chen who wrote (133235)	2/21/2001 11:37:40 AM
From: Scumbria	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1570497

Ali, Exactly. The Soviet Union died a long, protracted, painful death induced by starving the souls of their people for 80 years. There was nothing left for the Communists to hold on to. They had already destroyed everything of value. Scumbria

To: Ali Chen who wrote (133235)	2/21/2001 12:21:35 PM
From: hmaly	Respond to of 1570497

Ali Re..If you could have a chance to take a look at Soviet consumer shops in 80's, you would not need to read any "CIA intelligence materials" to form a correct opinion. <<<< I think it would be naive to believe that the cia only looks at intelligence photos; and didn't know about what was happening in the civilian sector. It was easy to know about the shortages. Iraq today has shortages; but does that mean Saddam can't dominate the mideast if he can attain the right weapons. Scumbrias post blaming the fall of Russia solely on the economy would be just like me accrediting the fall of Russia solely to Reagons defense build up. Certainly Russia had a poor civilian sector. Russia was able to paper over that weakness with a strong army. Over the course of history, many countries have routinely tried to cover other economic problems with a strong army. Germany rebuilt it's army in the 30's despite a major depression, Japan was involved in expanding its territory to gain access to raw materials well before Pearl Harbor. The question for the CIA wasn't the weakness of the civilian sector, but rather the combination of a weak civilian sector along with a strong army; and would the gov. try to paper over the civilian weaknesses through exspansionism. Did Reagons defense build up destroy Russia. Not by itself, but it helped. The main thing Reagon did though was support the Afghan insurgency and made Russia's army impotent. Afghanistan was Russia's Vietnam. Just as Russia supplied weapons which eventually lead to North Vietnams supremacy, The CIA, with Reagons support, supplied the weapons, (shoulder fired sidewinders, and antitank weapons) which allowed the insurgents to nullify Russia's main weapons (gunships and tanks); which allowed the guerillas to fight on their terms, not Russia's. The failure of Russia in Afghanistan, showed the world that it's army was a paper tiger. Russia couldn't dominate through intimidation anymore. And it lead to the realization in Russia that it's army couldn't overcome its civilian weakness through expansionism. Was there a danger of that happening. Sure, there are a lot of examples of countries doing just that. If Russia had been able to roll through Afghanistan, Russia, with its power and confidence might have been able to dominate the Asian and Indian subcontinent; and take from others what its civilian economy couldn't provide at home. A resurgent U. S. , along with a weakened russian army, made that impossible. And that impossibilty caused the people of Russia to say "no mas, no mas"